The whole world has been affected by the global pandemic caused by Covid-19 and has severely affect business, multiple industries and economies.  Due to this, the gambling market has been both affected positively and negatively for different sectors in the market and below we go into that in a little bit more detail.

The sub-sector of the industries that has been most affect has of course been that of land-based gambling locations such as high-street bookies and land-based casinos.  This is mainly because many governments highlighting them as a high-risk area for the spread of Covid-19 and has been that bad for the sector that many have has to close for good. Because of this, it has ensured that due to the closures, many have lost their jobs and with limited support from the government, they have really struggled to get by during this lock down.

Although this has been a struggle for many operators to be able to survive, they have been able to benefit in other ways; online gambling.  Operators have been able to take advantage of living in the digital age and with many therefore able to continue to gamble on their online alternatives. This has provided even more options for casino games, and more beneficial for online only sites like Bet365.

Another sub-sector that has really struggled during this pandemic is the sport betting area due to the lack of live sporting events going on because many if not all being cancelled due to not being able to practice social distancing whilst playing and therefore has basically cancelled the sector for 3 months. However, online casinos have been able to benefit from that due to their quality roulette, card tables and slot machines they have on offer.

Because of the no sporting events, the industry has had to miss out on many major revenue providing events such as the Grand National which is one of the biggest days of the year for the industry. However, the industry thought of putting on a Virtual Grand National which would go towards the NHS and ended up raising £3 million for the NHS. However, there were critics in the industry that have called this as a dark marketing ploy to push their other avenues that they support such as Virtual Football and many other sports and a way to entice in new customers that may become interested after betting on the Virtual Grand National.