The advertising of sports betting is sometimes its own worst enemy. The betting ads attract would-be bettors, but also would-be litigators and legislators.
FanDuel and DraftKings have maintained a very high profile with their advertising. Football season and March Madness are over, so the advertising goes into an offseason with the major sports. But the United States is not the only country with bookies advertising a lot. Australia is also experiencing the phenomenon and the fallout.
The Australian government of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese News announced a new gambling advertising policy on April 2. “The Albanese government is taking strong action to protect Australians, particularly children and young people, from the harms of gambling. New reforms include restrictions on gambling advertising and a crackdown on dodgy operators to protect vulnerable Australians. The reforms will minimize children’s exposure to gambling harm by stopping the deluge of advertisements through… banning the use of celebrities and sports players in gambling ads, along with odds-style ads targeting sports fans.”
It is a mouthful. The reactions have been mixed, but rarely favorable. First, even those who approve think the ban should go into effect sooner. As released, the policy is set to take effect on the first day of 2027. The most severe critics say the ban is a joke, a fool’s policy; it does not go far enough. The extreme critics want a total ban on gambling advertising and they want it now. Industry insiders believe the harm will be to the bookies, not the bettors. To answer that claim, an official report was released claiming that the ban will result in a total loss of $44 million in bets, just 0.8 percent of the annual wager amount. Fair enough, but if it’s true, then the bookies should rethink their promotional strategies.
This story has legs and will continue for a long time. Since the announcement, The Sydney Morning Herald has run something every day. The articles vary, from opinion pieces to commentaries on various aspects of the ban and its potential impacts. The April 8 headline read: ‘Dodgy lotteries’ facing ban as Albanese moves to shut down new betting front.” Communications Minister Anika Wells said, “These dodgy lotteries threaten the honest dream of people winning the jackpot on a Thursday night.” Which might be taken to mean: Our lottery is good. Yours is dodgy.
Minister Wells shed some light on the subject by saying that there were many moving parts to the story and many players. It had been necessary, according to Wells, to make some compromises along the way. Gambling is big business in Australia. The country has the highest per-capita spending on gambling in the world. Gambling also plays a big role in supporting sports teams. Even the harshest critics have to walk a fine line over some of the issues. The safest ground is clearing the airways of some of the clutter and protecting children. One critic said, Australians do not want to raise our children to think that there is an intrinsic connection between sports and gambling.
Like love and marriage, sports and gambling go together, right? And to many people, those ads cement the bond. That connection is questioned in many places. England and Italy are trying to break the emotional link. Sports-gambling advertisements are ubiquitous. The risk that bookies take with mass advertising is a backlash. Thus far, major bans on gambling advertising have been in other countries, but it is only a matter of time before the concept arrives on our shores.
Actually, the issue is not sports betting. Rather, it is mobile/online sports betting. If legal sports bets were restricted to retail outlets, there would be no issue and very little advertising. Mobile sports wagering is huge; 90 percent of the $165 billion handle in 2025 in this country was wagered remotely. That wagering pool supports the advertising. And the advertising puts the industry at risk.
Lawmakers in several states are demanding a ban on advertising. That is certainly a threat, but the larger threat is a total ban on gambling on sports, at least remotely. Two lawmakers in Ohio held a news conference Wednesday to introduce a bill to end remote wagering, limit wagers, ban credit cards, and tighten advertising rules.
This is an existential threat to an industry. Today, it is Australia, but tomorrow? Still, it is the offseason, so maybe the pressure will ease, except for those guys in Ohio.
