The legal gambling business estimates that up to half of market participants operate in the shadows

The legal gambling business estimates that 40-50% of the market operates in the shadows. About this reported head of the State Agency for Regulation of Gambling and Lotteries "PlayCity" Gennady Novikov in an interview with LIGA.net.

Novikov noted that in 2024, legal gambling companies paid about UAH 18 billion in taxes to the budget and another UAH 2 billion in license fees. In the first half of 2025, revenues amounted to UAH 9.6 billion.

"The legal market says that 40-50% is illegal, and intuitively we agree with them." – Novikov emphasized.

At the same time, he added that there are no official studies on this issue yet, but the regulator plans to conduct them in the near future to continue comparing data from year to year.

"We want to start measuring the ratio of the black market to the white market at least this year, so that next year at the same time we can order the same study and compare year to year."novikov said.

According to him, Ukraine currently has 19 legal online casinos, two online poker organizers, and four betting companies.

• PlayCity was established in March 2025 to replace the Commission for the Regulation of Gambling and Lotteries (CRGL) to regulate the gambling business.
• On August 4, it was reported that PlayCity fined eight licensed casinos in the total amount of UAH 3.2 million for violation of the law on state regulation of gambling.
• On August 20, PlayCity together with Meta blocked seven Instagram accounts, who systematically distributed illegal gambling advertising.
• On August 22, Ukraine launched a platform for tracking and blocking illegal casinos.