The Premier League Wants To Remove Betting And Gambling Sponsors

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Hey Friends,

The Premier League is asking its clubs to phase out betting and gambling sponsors.

The voluntary ban would go into effect next season. But it would allow existing betting and gambling sponsorships to finish no later than the 2024-25 season, and perimeter advertising (i.e., video screen ads surrounding the pitch) would still be allowed to continue under the current Premier League proposal.

Premier League Clubs With Sports Betting Kit Sponsors

• Brentford (Hollywoodbets)

• Everton (Stake.com)

• Leeds United (SBOTOP)

• Southampton (Sportsbet.io)

• West Ham United (Betway)

The Premier League’s proposal needs approval from 14 of the 20 teams (70%) to pass, and clubs have reportedly “been given just days to respond,” according to Sky Sports.

So why are they doing this? Well, despite clubs like West Ham United receiving more than $10 million annually from their shirt sponsorship with Betway, the Premier League is attempting to front-run future gambling regulation in the United Kingdom.

For those that don’t already know, gambling in the UK exploded after the 2005 Gambling Act. This regulated all forms of gambling in England, Wales, and Scotland, but it transferred the authority for licensed gambling from the magistrates’ court to local authorities, leading to a huge increase in gambling ads & marketing campaigns.

In turn, that created a widespread gambling problem. Nearly 50% of adults in the UK now gamble, and depending on the study you want to reference, somewhere between 1.5 million and 3 million people in the UK admit to having a gambling problem.

The higher end of that range represents nearly 5% of the entire UK population.

This has led to a higher suicide rate and more homelessness, both of which carry visual, emotional, and even financial repercussions. For example, harms associated with gambling were estimated to cost the United Kingdom at least £1.27 billion from 2019 to 2020: £619.2 million comes from the economic impact of suicide, while £62.8 million comes from the cost of homelessness associated with gambling.

This means more regulation is coming, and according to Wired, it’s coming fast.

So my guess is that this Premier League proposal eventually passes.

Not only are there currently only five teams that have primary sports betting partners—that’s down from almost 60% of clubs in England’s top two soccer divisions having gambling sponsors on their jersey kits in 2018—but none of the big six (Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool, Manchester City, Manchester United and Tottenham Hotspur) have existing jersey sponsorships with any betting and gambling companies.

Yet the bigger topic of conversation is the impact this has on American sports.

I get it. Some of you might think: What’s this have to do with American sports? And that’s fair. But I have long spoken about the fear that the United States is heading down a similar path—repeating the same mistakes the UK has over the last 15+ years.

For example, virtually every major American sports league and entity now allows sports betting partnerships, including the NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL, MLS, UFC, and PGA Tour, to name a few. The United Kingdom has aggressively pulled back on the use of credit cards for gambling, while the United States is aggressively expanding in that category. And it is becoming increasingly common in the United States to hear broadcasters discuss gambling odds before, during, and after a broadcast on live television—unlike the UK, which seems to be pulling away from that strategy entirely.

Heck, Nickelodeon even teamed up with the NFL to launch a website for kids that sure feels like an introduction to gambling: the NFL denies this, of course, but kids are encouraged to “Smash Your Pick” on who will win each game, provided with Weekly Pick’em Cards that closely resemble Pick’em and parlay cards, and also given points and rewards that encourage users to return every week for more action.

That doesn’t mean the United States (and sports leagues) should shut down an entire industry before it even gets going—I’m a strong advocate of individual freedom and the ability for people to make their own choices—but I do think this is something that will become more relevant over the next several years as betting continues to expand.

Most of the expansion we have seen in sports betting is driven by the incentive of increased revenue, profit, and shareholder returns. But what happens when the negatives start to outweigh the positives, especially for those with no skin in the game? That’s when things start to get interesting, and my guess is that we will eventually see more oversight at the federal level—I just hope it isn’t done too late.

Have a great day. I’ll talk to everyone tomorrow.

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