ICE London and its parallel affiliate event iGB Affiliate are two of the world’s largest gambling industry events. They always serve visitors with lots of surprises and glamour, and there’s nothing you can’t find there, no matter which industry niche you’re from. Since we at Gamblineers are in the crypto casino niche, we have looked at this year’s event from our perspective. And, although we had a great experience, we still wished we could see more crypto content and exhibitors.
CRYPTO IS AN ONGOING TREND
Even after several years of casinos massively including crypto payments and services into their existing environment to serve the incoming crypto hype, crypto growth in casinos still continues. Some of the most visible changes can be seen in the amount of game developers either supporting crypto in their games or even developing crypto-community-driven games like Dice and Crash; and in the amount of payment providers now supporting crypto deposits and the buy-crypto features. Most operators who serve both fiat and crypto agree that a lot of fiat players are switching to crypto. Even though the crypto market was only recently in its bullish state (or it still is, depending on who you ask), the use of crypto in gambling is still on the rise and we’re perfectly comfortable in saying crypto is no longer just a short hype, but an ongoing trend.
CRYPTO AT ICE
ICE London took place on February 7-9 at the ExCel Convention Centre. While the ICE London website says it’s a “gambling event that services the entire industry,” we nevertheless hoped to see the crypto trend rub off more on one of the major industry events. It’s not all black and white, though; there were some, although few, exhibitors flashing crypto signs and proudly displaying their presence in the crypto gambling industry, mostly exhibitors who offer payments services. Fiat gambling is a vast part of the industry and probably still will be, at least for some time, but the event left the impression that it’s still lagging behind on the crypto trend. There were fewer exhibitors at ICE last year due to Covid-19 and the changed date of the event; basically the entire land-based exhibition got left out, but there were a couple of crypto-related exhibitors anyway. This year, however, it felt like there was even less crypto at ICE than in the years before – even though there was much more going on in general.
CRYPTO AT IGB AFFILIATE
IGB Affiliate took place “downstairs” from the ICE exhibition on February 8-11. The story of iGB Affiliate is somewhat different compared to ICE from the crypto point of view. Although iGB Affiliate serves primarily affiliates, it also targets the entire gambling industry. And if anything crypto could only steal a couple of well-focused glances at ICE, you could get a full blast at iGB. There were plenty more crypto-oriented operators present at the event this year and they weren’t afraid to show their crypto love. Some crypto operators even had the biggest stands of all, really making their presence felt and almost obscuring everything else at the event. The event even expanded its floor area this year, hosting even more exhibitors than last year and therefore adding further crypto operators. However, while crypto was very well represented in the exhibition, it fell short at the conference programme. It would be very nice to have a little brush with the latest crypto market happenings, how crypto players behave compared to fiat and what kind of content and services are they looking for; but we’ll have to wait some more for that.
THE DIFFERENCE?
During last year’s events, the crypto market was thriving nicely, while this year it was still struggling to get out of its dips, so the crypto market situation definitely didn’t correlate to its representation at iGB Affiliate. Why there was such a difference between ICE and iGB in terms of crypto it’s hard to say. Maybe because the iGB Affiliate serves more the “frontline” of the industry, in this case the affiliates, who have first contact with the players; while ICE serves primarily operators in the backend, supporting their services.
WHAT ABOUT NEXT YEAR?
Although it would be nice to see the crypto gambling industry reflected more at the ICE exhibition, we honestly don’t expect things to change all that much, at least not so fast. On the other hand, iGB Affiliate might surprise given the changes we saw this year – and hopefully crypto will be mentioned even in the conference programme. ICE is currently evaluating whether to stay in London or move elsewhere after 2024. Who knows? Maybe the hint of exotic locations will be replaced by other crypto-friendly surprises, too!
This year, however, it felt like there was even less crypto at ICE than in the years before, even though there was much more going on in general
