Spanish gambling industry association, Cejuego, and the University Carlos III of Madrid have presented a study of the gaming industry in Spain titled the Spanish Gaming Yearbook for 2020. It presented Spain’s gaming revenue and considered the impact the ongoing pandemic had on the industry. 

The study shows revenue for the first ten months of 2020 fell to €4.4bn ($5.3bn), a 50% drop from the gross revenue for the same period in 2019. €2.4bn came from private gaming, and the State Lotteries and Betting and Organización Nacional de Ciegos Españoles (ONCE) earned €1.9bn. Meanwhile, €1.3bn went to gaming taxes: €197.3m from the State and €1.1bn from the Autonomous Communities. 

José Antonio Gómez Yáñez, the author of the study, said only 0.3% of all gambler display problem gambling behavior. Only 17% of young people participate in gambling, which is less than Europe’s average of 24%. Based on the data, in 2019, 84,797 people were employed in the gaming sector, half (47,047) of them in private gaming. Yáñez commented: “Companies are making a great effort to maintain their workforce despite the decline in their income.” 

According to InfoPlay, the CEO of Cejuego Alejandro Landaluce pointed out the data reveals the slow recovery of the market; he said: “The gaming industry is one of the ones that takes the longest to recover. In 2019 we had not recovered the levels prior to the 2008 economic crisis and now the situation is far worse.”