Gambling Ad Ban Has Hurt Sky TV Ad Revenue, New Report Reveals
Sky TV has revealed that the 2018 gambling advertisement ban has damaged its ad revenue.
The media giant, which is owned by Comcast, announced an 18.2% decrease in advertising revenue in the third quarter of 2019 due to the ban on gambling advertisements in the UK. The firm also claimed that the new gambling ad restrictions in Italy affected its revenue.
According to the report, Sky TV’s advertising revenue fell from $545 million in the third quarter of 2018 to $446 million in the same quarter of 2019. The third quarter of 2019 is the first since the ban on gambling advertisements came into effect last year, proving just how much the ban has damaged Sky TV’s revenue.
In its quarterly report which was released last week, Comcast said that the decline reflected an “unfavourable impact from a change in legislation related to gambling advertisements in the UK and Italy, as well as overall market weakness.”
Italy introduced its ban on gambling advertisements on January 1st this year. The ruling was a clamp-down on gambling advertisements and banned all gambling-related television advertisements, the distribution of branded items, advertorials, product placement and influencer marketing.
The Gambling Advertising Ban
The gambling advertising ban was backed in December 2018 by the Industry Group for Responsible Gambling (IRGR). Under the whistle-to-whistle ban, gambling advertisements cannot be shown on pre-watershed sports games both five minutes before and five minutes after the game.
However, the ban wasn’t made law until August 2019 which is why only Sky TV’s third quarter was affected by the ban. The ban has only been in effect for two months but it’s thought that it may damage the English Premier League’s revenue which started on August 10th, just nine days after the ban was introduced.
The ban was introduced as part of an effort to increase gambling regulation in the United Kingdom. This year saw the UK government cut the maximum betting amount on fixed-odds betting terminals from £100 to £2, sparking concern for numerous betting shops across the nation.
Meanwhile, the NHS launched its first-ever gambling clinic for children with aims to help youngsters aged between 13 and 25 with gambling or gaming-related problems. The NHS also opened a brand new gambling addiction clinic in Leeds this year, the first to open outside of London.