BGC Singles Out Black Market with £100m Boxing Day Stakes Estimate

The Betting and Gaming Council (BGC) has alleged up to £100 million could have been staked illegally on Boxing Day, having extrapolated data provided by H2 Gambling Capital.

Boxing Day is traditionally a busy day on the British sports betting calendar. There is usually a full program of football scheduled to be played on the day, albeit there was only one Premier League match on Boxing Day this year, with the other nine matches being moved to the weekend. It is also a notable day in the horseracing calendar, with the King George VI Chase taking place at Kempton Park.

The BGC mentioned how data from H2 Gambling Capital shows billions of pounds are staked on the black market annually. According to the BGC, Boxing Day accounts for around 1% of total annual betting activity, suggesting up to £100 million could be staked with illegal operators on that day.

Reading between the lines

It should be noted this is a rough guess from the BGC, and would only apply if the breakdown of betting on the black market played out in the same way as the legal market. The BGC also has a vested interest in publishing these types of figures, as it represents more than 90% of retail betting shops, online betting and gaming operators, casinos and bingo operators in the UK.

Grainne Hurst, BGC CEO, said:

“Boxing Day is one of the biggest days of the year for sport and betting, and the harmful illegal black market is gearing up for a huge payday, with Brits set to stake up to £100 million illegally in just 24 hours.”

Tax increase leads to increased focus

Highlighting the illegal gambling market and its potential size has been a common theme in communications from the BGC recently, in the wake of the announcement of upcoming tax increases for the industry.

In the November Budget, Chancellor Rachel Reeves announced remote gaming duty (RGD), paid on online casino bets, will rise from 21% to 40% of gross profit in April 2026.

There will be a further tax increase in April 2027, when general betting duty (GBD), paid on online sports betting, will go up from 15% to 25% of gross profit. Betting on horseracing will be exempt from this increase, with tax on those bets remaining at 15%.

A repeated argument

The BGC is keen to push the argument that this could lead to growth in the black market, as a result of operators making cuts to their marketing spend and reducing or removing bonus offers.

Earlier this month, the BGC published a release mentioning how the Office for Budget Responsibility had admitted the tax plans would reduce projected yield by around one third, including £500 million being lost by 2029/30.

In October, prior to the changes being announced by Reeves, the BGC published a report provided by Ernst & Young, which forecast a series of figures based on different tax increase scenarios. In one particular model, where RGD increased to 50% and GBD increased to 25%, 4,100 jobs were said to be at risk, with £8.4 billion in betting stakes moving to the black market.

When the Budget was announced, Hurst said:

“The Government’s Budget is a massive win for the incredibly harmful, unsafe, unregulated gambling black market, which pays no tax and offers none of the protections that exist in the regulated sector.”

Soon after the increases were announced, H2 Gambling Capital published a report in which it forecast gross gaming revenue in the illegal market could grow by £800 million as a result of the tax increases.