The gambling industry is one of the biggest victims of the Covid19 pandemic. If you take a look at the surface, you will see that nearly all betting activity has been postponed for almost 3 months. Only casino and poker actions were able to continue like before. Stock market prices for almost all gaming operators plunged, and that reflects on their balance sheets and the redundant personnel. This is just the tip of the iceberg. But what if you look under the surface?
Massive liquidity problems.
The need for urgent cash is evident all over. Let me present some of the facts as reported in our forum, so you get my point.
-2 out of 4 supported agents are still not able to pay customers in a proper manner.
-Bet365 stopped accepting Skrill and Neteller deposits and withdrawals globally.
-PaySafe raised fees and does whatever possible to reduce costs.
-Software providers have seen sales going down to 0, and that includes alert services.
-Bot action went down by 95%. This is valid for the bots that could still operate after the recent raid against them.
-A number of bookmakers stopped their affiliate schemes.
The list goes on to more sensitive areas.
It seems to me that all actors of the industry are holding a vacuum cleaner trying to suck any circulating cash, even pennies. As betting action is about to return to some sort of normality, we will immediately notice that margins are changed. Imagine a barbershop charging 20 euros for a haircut before lockdown, now opening again to the public, but requesting 25 euros for the same haircut. Now put the name of any bookmaker, any exchange, any e-wallet, etc to the place of the barbershop. This is exactly what we are going to see in the coming months.
There is an old saying that can be found in many countries. It goes like this: It takes a storm to show a good seaman. This Covid19 storm might have been the perfect storm and it now shows the good seamen. Unfortunately, we don't have many good seamen in this industry.
Massive liquidity problems.
The need for urgent cash is evident all over. Let me present some of the facts as reported in our forum, so you get my point.
-2 out of 4 supported agents are still not able to pay customers in a proper manner.
-Bet365 stopped accepting Skrill and Neteller deposits and withdrawals globally.
-PaySafe raised fees and does whatever possible to reduce costs.
-Software providers have seen sales going down to 0, and that includes alert services.
-Bot action went down by 95%. This is valid for the bots that could still operate after the recent raid against them.
-A number of bookmakers stopped their affiliate schemes.
The list goes on to more sensitive areas.
It seems to me that all actors of the industry are holding a vacuum cleaner trying to suck any circulating cash, even pennies. As betting action is about to return to some sort of normality, we will immediately notice that margins are changed. Imagine a barbershop charging 20 euros for a haircut before lockdown, now opening again to the public, but requesting 25 euros for the same haircut. Now put the name of any bookmaker, any exchange, any e-wallet, etc to the place of the barbershop. This is exactly what we are going to see in the coming months.
There is an old saying that can be found in many countries. It goes like this: It takes a storm to show a good seaman. This Covid19 storm might have been the perfect storm and it now shows the good seamen. Unfortunately, we don't have many good seamen in this industry.