FEATURE
THE FUTURE IS CRYPTO
Cryptocurrency-based gambling is going to be as big as traditional igaming – but not quite in the way you might imagine . Nick Garner explains why every affiliate needs to check out crypto-gambling operators
SOME BACKSTORY ON ME and crypto . In 2015 , I noticed something very interesting going on with bitcoin . As a moderate libertarian , I liked the way cryptocurrency was becoming ‘ internet money ’ without the blessing of governments and big corporations .
A parallel would be open source software : people collaborate , build something amazing and everybody benefits . If you ’ re reading this article online , open-source software is probably why you can see it at all .
With cryptocurrency there ’ s privacy and frictionless movement of money anywhere on the planet , as long as there ’ s internet connection and no government is involved . It ’ s like transacting with gold , except online . As the internet spawned online gambling , crypto will spawn new ways of gaming that we ’ ve never thought of .
In 2015 I decided to launch oshi . io , a crypto casino on the Softswiss platform . Writing about cryptocurrency in articles such as this has forced me to think about the future of crypto gambling – after all , my future now depends on it .
Figure 1 : The progress of the Nasdaq index ( in blue ) and bitcoin over their lifetimes , showing strikingly similar patterns
Figure 2 : A useful way to benchmark against traditional operators is to look at traffic numbers
That was then … Sometimes it helps to look at the past to understand the future . I ’ m old enough to remember the emergence of the internet as we know it . I remember the dotcom boom of the late 1990s , when friends schemed up ideas for online businesses . And I remember the bust of 2000 , when markets crashed and everyone thought the internet had died . In fact , it was the start of the internet age . In my opinion , 2018 will be the start of the crypto age .
The utility of blockchain is as a way of enabling safe , frictionless transactions while getting rid of middlemen . I believe crypto will follow the same trajectory as the internet in the longer term ( see Figure 1 ). According to Oristep Consulting , online gambling revenues will be around $ 81.71bn by 2022 . Global gambling revenue in general will probably hit $ 500bn by the same year .
For perspective , online gambling will equate to about 16 % of total gambling activity .
Just how big is crypto gambling ? A lot depends on how you define it . I see gambling as ‘ participating in games of chance ’. For cryptocurrency casinos running traditional games , such as slots and table games , my guess is that global annual revenues are about $ 4bn and by 2022 will probably be around the $ 10bn-a-year mark . I base my
“ In the bust of 2000 everyone thought the internet had died . In fact , it was the start of the internet age ”
prediction on crypto igaming gambling following a similar trajectory to the growth of cryptocurrency globally .
Figure 2 shows four successful online casino brands and three of the biggest crypto operators by traffic volumes as of June 2018 . Never heard of Betchan ? Strange , because according to this traffic volume data , it gets more visitors than 888 . com .
Why do people like crypto casino ? In short , because it ’ s less hassle . A player can register an account within 15 seconds , deposit money within one minute and get gambling . Since most crypto casinos are
26 iGB Affiliate Issue 70 AUG / SEP 2018