China posts first year-on-year lottery sales growth of 2020

Chinese lottery sales grew 10.4% year-on-year to CNY36.15bn in July, marking the first month of 2020 to record year-on-year growth, thanks to a significant increase in betting sales.

Welfare lottery sales came to CNY15.44bn, up 2.6%, while sports lottery sales grew 17.1% to CNY20.71bn.

Digital lottery sales came to 22.42bn, representing a 17.3% year-on-year rise, though a 1.3% decline compared to June this year. 

Instant win sales were up 17.3% to CNY2.67bn, while the standout performer was prediction-based (betting) products. Sales for this vertical totalled CNY9.31bn, representing a 13.7% improvement on the prior yera, and a 46.4% month-over-month increase. In July alone the vertical's total almost surpassed that of the previous five months combined.

Both video lottery products and keno struggled during the month, however. Video lottery sales fell 46.1% to CNY1.73bn, and keno, traditionally the smallest vertical, saw sales decline 14.5% to CNY13.5m.

Year-to-date lottery sales now total CNY160.05bn, but this remains 34.8% below 2019, after the first half of 2020 was disrupted by the novel coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic. Year-to-date welfare lottery sales stand at CNY74.72bn, down 33.8%, while sports lottery sales for the year are down 35.6% at CNY47.20bn.

July marks the first month of year-on-year improvement in 2020 for the Chinese lottery market and a high point for the year to date, overtaking June’s total.

The sales declined 43.4% in January before collapsing by 99.99% to just CNY1.3m in February with almost all lottery products temporarily taken out of circulation. While the market began to recover in March, sales remained 69.9% below 2019, with April, May and June all also representing month-on-month improvements but year-on-year declines.

For the first half of 2019, lottery sales came to CNY123.90bn, down 41.7% year-on-year.