French trade body data reveals surge in black-market activity at Euro 2024

The Association Française du Jeu en Ligne (AFJEL) has revealed Euro 2024 underwhelmed for licensed operators but the that black market continues to go from strength to strength.

Members of the AFJEL, the French gambling trade body, put forward data taken from the duration of Euro 2024 and discovered the figures were notably below what was expected pre-tournament.

This was despite the fact that France reached the semi-final stage of the competition and was among the favourites to win the tournament before losing to Spain 2-1 on 9 July.

One of the standout features the data highlighted was a lack of growth in stakes this tournament compared to Euro 2020, which was held three years ago in 2021 due to Covid-19, and recorded €700m in stakes.

Research also identified a 25% decrease in stakes compared to the 2022 World Cup, which posted a total of €900m.

Ahead of Euro 2024 the ANJ, the French industry regulator, predicted that the competition would inspire a record total of €1bn generated in bets placed.

However, the AFJEL’s data has determined the actual tally is 50% lower than that estimate.

That comes off the back of a 2022 that showed a stagnation in growth in the legal market despite the World Cup, before 2023 saw a 5.3% decline in the number of unique players in the market compared to the previous year.

That drop, which goes against trends witnessed in other European regulated markets, can be attributed to the fact that as of 2023, France’s black market has boasted more players than the nation’s legal market for the first time since regulation in 2010, per AFJEL data.

Those players engaging with illegal operators totalled four million last year, according to findings from the French trade body, while the legal market total sat at 3.6 million players across 2023.

Only operators approved by the ANJ are permitted to offer online sports betting in France, but online casino sites – which are currently banned in the country – have illegally offered bets on Euro 2024, without any of the required supervision or protection measures for players, according to the AFJEL.

Nicolas Béraud, AFJEL president, said: “The first assessment of Euro 2024 reveals figures that are the polar opposite of the so-called online sports betting frenzy announced on the legal market.

“The first observation made by the approved operators is that the competition went very
well. There are several reasons for this. The first is that the operators played the game, in accordance with the ANJ guidelines and the rules for the protection of players whose systems continue to be improved. 

“The second [reason] is that they perfectly respected their additional commitments, which they
had initiated, and which they had taken within the framework of several charters.”

Béraud went on to make his feelings on the black market’s impact crystal clear, arguing illegal operators had been allowed to take players on with “complete impunity”.

He remarked: “The second observation is that if Euro 2024 shows surprisingly low results for approved operators, the illegal market is now continuing its very strong expansion through the cannibalisation of the online sports betting sector by diverting players away from the legal offer.

“Illegal online casino sites have offered, with complete impunity, a sports betting offer on Euro 2024 with very attractive odds and without any player protection measures.

“Despite the actions taken by the regulator, blocking illegal sites still does not work. There are now more than four million players who are exposed to major risks.”

Prior to the start of the Euro 2024 tournament, the ANJ unveiled a marketing campaign aiming to shed light on the risk of sports betting addiction.

The ANJ cited research from 2019 that suggested 1.4 million people in France were at risk of gambling-related harm, while 400,000 people were already suffering at a “pathological level”.

The French regulator’s 2024-26 strategy aims to drastically reduce the number of problem gamblers in the country within three years.