A Look At The World’s Biggest Online Casinos
Global online gambling is undergoing an explosion of interest, with industry revenue recently estimated to hit nearly $60 billion by 2020. While there are hundreds of smaller independent online casinos, five large companies have become the global leaders in the industry. Here is a rundown of the world’s biggest online casinos, along with their positives and negatives.
Kindred Group
Registered in Malta and trading on the Stockholm Stock Exchange, this massive company has a current market cap of over $26 billion. The company is an outgrowth of Unibet, a small online gambling company that was formed in 1999 by Swedish born founder Anders Strom. He went on to acquire 11 of Europe’s biggest gambling sites over the next 20 years and in 2016 the company officially changed its name to Kindred Group.
Much of the company’s success is related to its mobile offerings. Unibet was an early pioneer in rolling out gambling apps and mobile offerings and it continues to be a major leader in that market segment, with 21 million registered users across the globe.
Paddy Power Betfair
Registered in Dublin, Ireland and trading on London Stock Exchange, the company currently has a market cap of nearly $6 billion. The company was created in 1988 after the merger of three major Irish bookmakers. The company now runs more than 500 booking shops in the U.K. and Ireland. It also runs a number of online casino web sites, including paddypower.com, paddypowergames.com, paddypowerpoker.com and paddypowercasino.com. Paddy Power merged with UK gambling giant Betfair in 2016, creating a huge company that spans the globe.
The Stars Group
Registered in Canada and trading on NASDAQ and the Toronto Stock Exchange, the company currently has a market cap of just over $5 billion. Formerly known as Amalya, the company came to prominence in 2014 when it purchased PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker for $4.9 billion. It currently runs a group of prominent online gambling sites, including PokerStars Casino, Full Tilt Poker and BetStars. It also owns and operates a series of successful regional poker tours such as PokerStars Players No Limit Hold’em Championship, the Asia Pacific Poker Tour and the European Poker Tour.
GVC Holdings
Registered in the Isle of Man and publicly traded on the London Stock Exchange, the company currently has a market cap of just under $5 billion. Founded in 2004 in Luxembourg, the company currently runs 10 web sites and has found much success operating sites that target local residents in their language. They include the German language-centric CasinoClub, the Italian-language sites Gioco Digitale and Cashcade as well as the South American focused betboo.
William Hill
Founded in Gibraltar and publicly trading on the London Stock Exchange, the company dates back to 1934, at a time when gambling was still illegal in England. The company currently operates 2,300 betting shops in the UK, as well as online casinos and a sportings book company. But the company has faced a series of lawsuits in recent years, most recently from the family of a man who claimed one of the company’s casinos allowed him to lost more than $800,000, even though he had an annual income of less than $50,000.
