Australia’s smartest wagering mind, Matt Tripp, expects the COVID betting boom to continue and become the “new norm” for the industry. The betr chairman said that “enough water has gone under the bridge” after the COVID “caffeine hit” to indicate that there will be no drop off in betting.
Talking to News Corp, Tripp pointed to the healthy betting landscape in Australia and revisited his predictions about the wagering industry from a year ago. He said that even though he was initially warning that the COVID sugar hit wasn’t sustainable, it was now evident that the market continued to grow.
No COVID Cliff in Sight
Tripp admitted that the betting industry didn’t grow like it used to, but that it was unrealistic to expect anything else. Still, he called attention to the fact that the market was “growing year on year” even after 12 months of normalcy after COVID.
Tripp said that even though everyone was afraid of the “COVID cliff” and what would happen after things returned to normal, he didn’t see any of that. The betr mogul added that betting operators had “stood the test of time” and that the industry was in “a really good place at the moment.”
Betr to Continue Growing
Tripp knows the Australian betting market inside out and was at the helm of Sportsbet, BetEasy, and CrownBet. He is currently in charge of betr, a bookie growing super fast, having already attracted 300,000 new players. Tripp is also the executive chairman of four-time NRL champions Melbourne Storm.
He is currently negotiating a takeover of PointsBet’s Australian wagering arm and admitted that the only way for betr to make it in the Australian landscape was to continue expanding.
Tripp said that “to be a small-scale operator” in Australia was “a hard thing,” considering the increase in product fees and the hike in the point of consumption tax.
Having News Corp as a Partner Helps
Tripp was grateful that betr had one thing other bookmakers didn’t – the help of a media conglomerate like News Corp. He said that they were doing their best to “get a small business off the ground” and that being partners with News Corp made things a lot easier.
The former BetEasy and Sportsbet executive is also in support of tighter advertising restrictions. He said that the industry couldn’t “just be seen to be doing the right thing” but that they had to do it, calling for more regulation around advertising.
