Opportunity available to emulate other nations in sports betting framework

In Vietnam, the sports betting business is relatively new. According to a 2017 decree, Vietnam allows betting on horse racing, greyhound racing, and international football, but does not encourage it.

Opportunity available to emulate other nations in sports betting framework, illustration photo/ Source: freepik.com

In January, the Ministry of Finance allowed Vietnam Lottery One Member Co., Ltd. to become the first enterprise to pilot an international football betting business with a list of accompanying tournaments. People must be 21 years or older in order to place bets.

“The model will be deployed according to a roadmap from simple to complex betting products, suitable to the conditions of management, administration, and supervision of the state. This phase helps the community to gradually adapt and change to have a positive view of modern entertainment activities,” said Nguyen Van Hung, Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism.

Tran Duc Phan, deputy general director of the Vietnam Sports Administration, said that despite the decree, sports betting in Vietnam had not been widely implemented due to problems with the bidding law and many other related issues, causing the sports economy to lose out on vast amounts of profit.

“The sports lottery market could bring in around $4-8 billion per year, but we’re losing that money through the world’s other betting sites,” he said.

Many countries have legalised sports betting for entertainment, but manage to limit its negative impacts and take advantage of the abundant resources it creates for economic development.

In the United Kingdom, a law legalising betting on horse racing dates back to the 1960s. The UK also passed the Gambling Act in 2005. Revenues from sports betting are allocated by the government to social fields, with priority given to cultural and artistic activities, sports, education, and health.

Germany allows sports betting as an exclusive business of state governments. The revenue is used to develop sports activities across the country, with about half used to finance community sports.

Many states in the United States have also legalised sports betting. During the 2022 FIFA World Cup, Americans spent about $1.7 billion on betting activities, according to Bloomberg Intelligence. However, the amount of money being bet on football is only a fraction of the $7.6 billion poured into the Super Bowl.

Statistics from Legal Sport Report at the end of last year show that some states in the US have collected a large amount of tax generated from betting. New York generated $1.1 billion in betting revenue and brought in nearly $550 million in taxes, compared with $264 million and $15 million in Arizona, respectively.

In Asia, Singapore was one of the first countries to legalise sports betting. In 1968, its government established the Singapore Pools Entertainment Complex, a state-owned monopoly that organises sports betting with the goal of mobilising finance to support community development.

In 2002, Singapore began legalising international football betting, paving the way for betting on many other sports later, such as motor racing, horse racing, basketball, baseball, golf, rugby, and boxing.

According to Transparency Market Research, annual global betting revenues are expected to reach $134.5 billion by 2027.

Proposal steers sports betting to starting line A proposed national steering committee is expected to help Vietnam build clearer prize-winning entertainment rules and set up closer connections between government authorities and investors in regards to horse and greyhound racing, as well as more efficiently explore billions of US dollars entering the lucrative industry.