With the rapid digitization of financial transactions in South Asia, and demonetization in India in particular, the landscape of casino payments has also seen significant shifts. Detailed information on such matters is difficult to find, but a recent research paper on online casino payments sheds some light on the current state of affairs in this field.
The study analyses the payment behaviours of local casino players on the basis of insider hard data on monetary transactions executed over the course of the first five months of this year from the region of South Asia on one of the leading internationally licensed online casino platforms operating in the area Casino Days.
In the paper, the researchers explore popular payment methods, market trends, transaction success rates, quantity versus amount, and more aspects of the online casino payments landscape in the region with the aim to gain valuable insights into the preferences of local players.
Understanding the payment behaviours of users can help operators optimise their services and provide a seamless real money deposit and withdrawal experience. As digitization continues to shape the financial landscape, offering diverse payment options, ensuring transaction security, and prioritising fast withdrawals are key factors contributing to the success of any online casino venue, the researchers’ conclusions stress.
The most interesting finding from the online casino data analysis performed by the Casino Days research team concerns the peculiar variations in payment preferences between seasoned and non-seasoned players.
Veteran players exhibit a three times stronger preference for using debit and credit cards such as VISA or MasterCard, compared to newbies on the virtual casino floor, the data shows.
While 62% of payments by seasoned casino gamers were executed through mobile banking and payment apps like Google Pay, PayTM, or PhonePe, and 30% went through cards, figures paint a varied picture for newer players.
Unseasoned gamblers use much more predominantly smartphone app and net banking solutions (83%), and cards were used in only 10% of successfully executed deposits and withdrawals by such players.
Looking at the broader structure of online casino payments, we can see the sheer dominance enjoyed by mobile app and banking gateways measured at 87% of the total quantity of successful transactions. Still, such transactions have carried over 71% of the total paid values, suggesting that such solutions are generally used for transacting smaller amounts.
Debit and credit cards, in contrast, carry a disproportionately heavier monetary weight (21.25%) than their share of the total number of transactions (8%).
Additionally, payment wallets like Skrill, Neteller, AstroPay, and Muchbetter contribute 4.90% of all transactions and 6.75% of the transferred amounts, adding further diversity to the payment landscape, as the researchers point out.
Cryptocurrencies have carried just 1% of the total transacted volumes, but this has been achieved with only 0.1% of the whole transaction quantity, which makes cryptocurrency the most heavily loaded transaction type.
Blockchain-based payments also boast the highest success rate (95%) of all transaction methods, compared to mobile app and banking (76%), cards (65%), and payment wallets (55%).
Diving deeper into card payments, we see a substantial increase by 24% in their share achieved over the first five months of 2023, with debit and credit plastics starting the year at 17%, and ending up with a share of 21% in May.
The authors of the study attribute the increase mainly to the recent integration of local Indian card system RuPay into the Google Pay UPI network.
At the same time, “reports show that the number of debit and credit cards exceeded the one billion mark in India at the end of September 2022, which is a 19% increase within a 12-month period,” the researchers point out.
Looking at the findings from the Casino Days research paper on payments in their entirety, we can infer some generalized image of the online casino veteran from South Asia. This is a person who is generally more inclined to use card payments than the rest of the field and tends to play with larger amounts at hand.
It would be intriguing to see further and more detailed research on why experienced casino fans behave like this when it comes to payments. Perhaps many of them come from older generations who are not fully comfortable with the latest technologies in online transactions.
Still, more than half of payments by seasoned players were done through mobile apps, and considering that even card paying veterans are doing it in order to play online casino, these people can’t be that bad with modern technology.
Most probably, a number of online casino veterans formed their payment preferences back in the times when cards were the most convenient option and old habits just die hard.
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