Market entry in practice: How hard is entry, really?

Partially Regulated - There is no single overarching statute regulating gambling activities in Australia, nor is there a single overarching gambling regulator. Instead, gambling in Australia is regulated at the state, territory and federal level. Each of Australia’s eight mainland states and territories separately regulates gambling activities (both land-based and online) within each of their respective jurisdictions. In addition, a series of federal statutes also cover certain aspects of gambling activity (including protection of personal information) throughout Australia. Whilst online betting and lotteries are permitted subject to the operator holding an Australian licence (issued by a state or territory government), online bingo and online casino-style products (including poker) are all currently prohibited. Skill-based games are often difficult to categorise under gambling laws in Australia although, arguably, will not constitute gambling in some jurisdictions where they are entirely and demonstrably skill-based. These products currently fall into a relatively ‘grey area’ for Australian law purposes and are not prominently promoted. The provision of software to gambling operators and gambling-related ‘B2B services’ is permitted generally with a relevant licence often being required (e.g. as an approved supplier) for certain gambling services and testing requirements and adherence to prescribed technical standards being required in other circumstances. These requirements need to be assessed on a product and state and territory basis. ## Market Size Australians spend the most in the world, per capita, on legal forms of gambling. In 2022, reports recorded that three in 4 (73%) Australians aged 18 and over reported spending money on one or more gambling products in the previous 12 months. Lotteries/scratchies were the product with the highest participation (64%), followed by race betting (horse, greyhound and/or harness racing) (39%), sports betting (34%) and poker machines/‘pokies’ (33%). Total Australian expenditure on online gambling increased from $5.57 billion in 2019 to $9.56 billion in 2022, representing an increase of 72%.