iGB Podcast Episode 39 returns after iGB L!VE, with hosts Robin Harrison and Ed Birkin from H2 Gambling Capital presenting a set of figures that are embarrassing for policymakers. The Dutch gambling tax was raised twice last year and this year, with the Treasury forecasting an additional revenue of **€108 million** by 2025 — but only **€2 million** was actually received. The shortfall for 2026 is equally glaring: forecasted at **€216 million**, with current estimates only reaching **€57 million**. The discussion between the two starts with this tax arithmetic and extends to the trading behaviors in the World Cup prediction markets, the implementation of Ireland's new licensing system, and signals of collective cooperation in African regulation. PASA's official website has identified four key points worth marking from this conversation.
The Netherlands has taxed itself into a dead end
The Dutch gambling tax increased from 30.5% to 34.2% in January 2025, and will rise again to 37.8% in January 2026. The Treasury's calculations for these increases looked good on paper — a combined annual increase of over €300 million. However, the reality is quite different. Birkin cautiously pointed out on the show that the blame cannot be solely placed on the tax rate itself. The income retraction effect after the 2024 European Championship, new deposit limits, and the cumulative effect of advertising bans have all compressed the tax base. The increase in tax rate only meant that a larger slice of an already shrinking cake was taken by the government, with almost no increase in total tax revenue.
The signals from the physical sector are even more negative. Visits to casinos and betting halls have dropped by about 11%, and several operators have publicly listed the tax increase as a key reason for closing down. For policymakers, the lesson from this arithmetic problem is deeper than the numbers themselves: higher taxes do not necessarily lead to higher revenues, especially if the tax base is shrinking rapidly at the same time, resulting in actual revenues far below the predictions in Excel spreadsheets.
World Cup Prediction Market: Congo was heavily bet on, a certain match cost all models dearly
H2 continuously tracked the trading behavior in the prediction markets throughout the World Cup. In terms of trading volume, the Democratic Republic of Congo was "the most financially supported non-champion team" — many traders bet that this African powerhouse would go far. France, Spain, and Portugal led the rankings for "most favored to win the championship."
However, the most intriguing discovery in this episode of the podcast comes from a data dimension left as a cliffhanger by the two hosts — the match with the most loss-making trades. They did not specify the particular matches in the program description but hinted that these matches shared an unexpected commonality, which was most advantageous for traditional sports betting companies, while the prediction market platforms collectively fell into the same trap. This description suggests that the outcomes were highly dependent on a predictable variable (such as overtime, penalties, or specific player events), and traditional sports betting, relying on historical odds models, had ample pricing experience for such scenarios, whereas the prediction market suffered from a systemic misjudgment on certain signals.
New Irish License Goes Live, but iGaming Still Floats Overseas
Crossing the English Channel, Ireland's new gambling regulatory system officially took effect under the GRAI framework on July 1. Currently, 89% of online betting in Ireland is handled by local licensed institutions, but this only accounts for 35% of the entire gambling market — because all iGaming activities are still unregulated and based overseas. The real channelization rate will only be measurable once iGaming is included in the regulatory framework. Platform providers like Pragmatic Solutions have already launched to support operators in the transition, with H2 discussing market size estimates in more detail in the full episode.
African Summit: Ed Birkin Asked an Avoided Question
Robin's personal highlight at iGB L!VE was the African Summit. Regulatory bodies from Nigeria, South Africa, Kenya, and other countries gathered with industry organizations like the African Tax Administration Forum to discuss sustainable taxation, player channelization, and player protection, and added momentum to the plans for the All-Africa Safe Gambling Week.
Birkin, who chaired the tax discussion panel at the summit, posed a challenging question at the end of the show: If some operators in certain markets choose to quietly absorb the costs or outright evade when faced with punitive tax rates, can the industry still legitimately oppose high tax rates elsewhere? This question is pointed because it directly hits a tacit weak spot in the industry's debate on tax policy — loudly opposing tax increases in their core European markets while silently digesting the same or even higher rates in other markets, thereby undermining the industry's overall consistency in discourse.
PASA's official website believes that the four threads of this episode, while independent, all point to the same underlying proposition: the gambling industry's policy-making is entering a "data backlash" phase. The Dutch tax experiment has debunked policy prediction models with real numbers, certain trading behaviors in the World Cup prediction market have exposed systemic blind spots in collective intelligence, Ireland's licensing system has reminded the industry that "betting localization ≠ full category regulation," and Ed Birkin's final question has elevated the tax policy debate from "whether to increase" to a more difficult level — "Does your basis for opposing tax increases still stand in your global layout?"
————
This article is from "PASA-Global iGaming Leaders," a gambling industry news channel: https://t.me/pasa_news
Original deep channel for gambling: https://t.me/gamblingdeep
Free data reports: @pasa_research
PASA Matrix: @pasa002_bot
PASA official website: https://www.pasa.news
