China lotteries post lowest sales since May in October

| By Daniel O'Boyle
Golden Week celebrations in China contributed to a month-on-month decline in lottery sales in October, but despite the continued suspension of video lotteries, overall sales were up 11.5% from October 2019 to CNY30.72bn (£3.50bn/€3.90bn/$4.67bn).

Sports Lottery made up the majority of sales, at CNY18.43bn. While this was the lowest figure since June, it was up 24.0% year-on-year.

The largest contributor to Sports Lottery sales were numbers games, bringing in CNY8.86bn, up 34.8% year-on-year despite the lowest sales since March. Sports betting, on the other hand, saw sales grow 13.6% to CNY8.40bn

Instant win sports lottery games brought in CNY1.36bn, a 2.9% increase, while sports video lottery sales remained very low at only CNY50,000.

The Welfare Lottery, meanwhile, brought in CNY12.28bn, down 5.4% from 2019 and at its lowest mark since April.

With video lottery terminals – which brought in CNY2.66bn in 2019 – suspended for the Welfare Lottery ahead of an outright ban from early 2021, numbers games continued to dominate, bringing in CNY10.68bn, up 20.6% but below each of the previous six months.

Instant win games contributed much of the rest of the total, after increasing 33.9% year-on-year to CNY1.54bn.

While every other game that was available declined month-on-month, Keno experienced significant growth, up 320.0% month-on-month and 412.2% from last year to CNY60.2m.

So far this year, lottery sales in China total CNY261.40bn, down 23.9% from 2019.

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