The Shadow Economy in Ukraine’s Gambling Industry: The Illegal Sector Has Grown to 56.7%
15 May 12:07
The share of the illegal segment of Ukraine’s gambling market rose from 52.1% to 56.7% in 2026, according to the results of a second study conducted by the international firm Kantar in March–May 2026, which were presented by Oleksandr Kogut, president of the Association of Ukrainian Gambling Operators (AUG). This was reported by "Komersant Ukrainian" with reference to Interfax-Ukraine.
“The results are significantly worse than we expected. The share of the illegal market in monetary terms has grown from 52.1% to 56.7%. The volume of the illegal market amounts to at least 61.6 billion UAH,” he noted.
Kogut emphasized that the study confirms the current trend—the unlicensed segment is growing aggressively and continues to take market share from the legal market.
“Ukrainian players continue to migrate to the gray zone. Over 80.6% of respondents have already played at online casinos or placed bets through illegal operators in the last three months,” the association’s president stated.
As clarified by the AUOGB, the representative study was conducted among 2,500 respondents using the Kantar Access Panel—a platform that allows for analyzing consumer behavior, conducting representative surveys, and testing advertisements, brands, and products. The study analyzed perceptions of 56 gambling brands—both legal and illegal—as identified by market operators.
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According to preliminary results, the main reasons Ukrainians choose illegal online casinos are: speed of payouts (49% of respondents), no restrictions on play (44%), better bonuses (37%), the ability to optimize taxes (25%), and more convenient registration (18%).
Other advantages mentioned include the ability to play and receive winnings using cryptocurrencies (6%) and circumventing legally established age restrictions (2%).
When assessing brand awareness among gambling operators, it was found that 15 of the top 30 brands known to and used by consumers belong to illegal gambling platforms.
According to the association, the study demonstrated for the second time that among the fundamental causes of market shadowing, the most significant are the ineffective blocking of illegal gambling platforms, which face almost no restrictions on marketing their services, administrative restrictions on the operations of legal operators, the uninterrupted functioning within the banking system of “quasi-processing” services that serve illegal casinos, as well as reputational pressure surrounding the gambling industry.
“If the situation remains status quo and the legal market continues to be ‘squeezed’ under the guise of combating gambling addiction, the market’s shift in favor of illegal operators will only accelerate. Ukrainians will continue to flock to the unregulated segment, and the state will lose tax revenue due to the shadowing of the industry,” Kogut believes.
According to him, reducing the size of the illegal market requires a high-quality government program to combat illegal gambling. The head of the AUOGB cited the protracted procedure for blocking illegal sites as an example: it takes at least 10 days to shut down a single illegal online casino, while mirror clone sites are created in 1–2 days. In February 2026, the Association proposed a new algorithm for blocking illegal domains to the regulator, but it has not yet been implemented. The proposed mechanism provides for the immediate blocking of illegal sites and is already being used by the NBU and the NSDC to block phishing resources.
According to Kogut’s forecasts, the legal segment’s revenue is expected to decline by more than 10–15% by the end of the first quarter of 2026, which will obviously lead to a reduction in tax revenues from the industry in 2026.
As reported, in September 2025, Kantar, Gradus, and Factum Group conducted the first independent comprehensive studies on the level of shadow economy activity in the gambling industry. According to their findings, the illegal segment accounted for between 39% and 53% of the market. According to forecasts by the international company H2 Gambling Capital, the share of illegal gambling in Ukraine could rise to 58% by 2030.
The next Kantar study is scheduled for September–October 2026.
According to preliminary data from the State Tax Service, the total revenue of the Ukrainian iGaming market in 2025 was 47.1 billion UAH, while according to AOUGB estimates, the industry’s actual annual revenue in 2025 exceeded 62.07 billion UAH. The discrepancy is due to the fact that not all operators submitted annual reports due to the expiration of their licenses.
Last year, the Ukrainian gambling industry paid UAH 17.4 billion in taxes to the state budget, compared to UAH 17.1 billion in 2024, UAH 10.4 billion in 2023, UAH 0.72 billion in 2022, and UAH 0.24 billion in 2021.
Founded in 2025, the Association of Ukrainian Gambling Operators is an independent self-regulatory organization that brings together the eight largest licensed operators in the industry, which account for approximately 82% of all tax revenues in the sector. Its stated goal is to establish transparent rules for market operations and combat illegal business activities.
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