China lottery sales up 31.4% in January

The Welfare Lottery accounted for CNY15.21bn in sales, up 18%, while the Sports Lottery accounted for CNY20.54bn, up 43.5%.

Across both lotteries, digital lotto ticket sales accounted for CNY21.94bn, up 46.5% year-on-year, making up 79.8% of Welfare Lottery sales and 47.7% of Sports Lottery sales.

Sports betting brought in CNY8.88bn, accounting for a further 43.2% of the Sports Lottery’s sales, and showing an increase of 30.5% from January 2020.

Instant games brought in CNY2.17bn for the Welfare Lottery, up 35.3%, and CNY1.87bn for the Sports Lottery, up 59.8%.

The next largest vertical was keno games, which brought in 894m for the Welfare Lottery, more than 90 times more than the 9.8m brought in for the same period last year.

Sales in the video lottery vertical were effectively wiped out in the period, bringing in just 190,000 compared to 2.65bn in January 2020.

All of the country’s 31 provinces except Guangxi showed an increase in sales from January 2020, with some provinces showing growth of over 60%. Sales in Guangxi decreased by 2.1%.

In November, it was announced that China would begin implementing a ban on certain high-frequency lottery products, with restrictions coming into force in stages between November 2020 and February 2021.

Results published in January showed that lottery sales in the country were down 20.8% in 2020 amid the disruption of the novel coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic, generating CNY333.95bn throughout the year.