Which sport is the biggest earner for the bookies?

England - FOBTs

Ireland - would guess football or horses

No chance its golf

Football/horses with the rest a distant 3rd

Assuming we are talking Turnover then it's

1. Football
2. Horses

u all braindead its horses how many them losers bet on anything else

Not hard to work out.You can have your house on in a football match and you cant get a box of rice crispies on in a horse race.

Horses then Football I reckon

All other sports combined woundn't be as big an earner as Football IMO

Monte Christo,s answer seem the most Feasible , as for myself golf has cost me more money then the others.

If a bookie has shops as his main thrust it is horses , soccer .  They constitute 90% of the continuing interest for those who bet regularly in SP shops .

On line bookie activists may have a different mix , cricket , golf may enter into the mix depending on their interest in involvement on those sports . Other sports are fairly seasonal including GAA .

50% horses, 50% everting else , imo

the biggest money spinner = bags greyhounds

Got to be football, every young lad in the country thinks he's a football expert and bets accordingly

irecon anyone betting on bags greyhound racing should think again,the odds are a joke, as one manager told me it pays for the staffs wages.the rest is profit for the big firms.

the biggest earner sportwise is horse racing , non sport obviously fobs

The average O/R on bags greyhounds is 150%.

Does the original question relate to volume as in turnover,volume of profit or largest profit margin?

An element of Paddy Power's financial statements which is truly shocking and does not receive any media attention is that gaming (Casino,bingo and games) net revenue equates to one third of the total online sportsbook's (horses,soccer,golf etc) revenue.For the second half alone of 2013 they made €61 million from gaming which is risk free business.

I have owned a couple of betting shops in the Manchester area pre fob days and horse racing was in those days 60 - 70 % , worked for a local firm who have 9 shops in the area , slips are now way down on horse racing , definitely a dying game and if it wasn't for the fobs they might as well close now , profits probably 5k a month on average but expenses probably around 8k a month but the fobs make over 10k a month

The extent of the profitability of fixed odds betting terminals is highlighted by contrasting the retail profit margins of PP in the UK versus ROI over a 6 month period.

                                  UK                 ROI                                                                                                         
Staked                      -€302  million    493 million
Sportsbook                  -€32.5 million    58  million
Machines                    -€29.1 million
Net Revenue (before costs)  -€61.6 million    58  million
MARGIN                       20.39%           11.7%
Operating Profit            -€7.8  million    7.6 million
Number of Shops             -220              228

The Irish shops are obviously much busier due to competition constraints I presume but the contrasting profit margins are interesting

Just a couple of points on those figures..

There are no competition constraints in Ireland.
                                                                                                          The figures show the gross over the counter turnover for both operations as amounts staked.The margin on this element of the business is quite similar at 10.7% against 11.7%.However the per shop turnover is far higher here (over 63% higher).The NET profit from the machines brings the operating profit per shop to a remarkably similar figure.

The margin figures highlighted are totally irrelevant as they are not comparing like with like.

The interesting thing highlighted by these figures is the difference in over the counter turnover per shop.I think the reason is that so much of the UK punters money is channelled into machines and therefore is not available to gamble over the counter.

Tolmi I am surprised at you my whole point was that the reduced turnover per shop equates to similar profits due to the increased margin derived from the machines."The extent of the profitability of fixed odds betting terminals is highlighted by contrasting the retail profit margins of PP in the UK versus ROI over a 6 month period."I thought the previous statement made it clear that I was highlighting the influence of the machines

The margin figures are completely relevant because they highlight the profitability of the machines.

There is much less competition here in comparison to the UK high street due to the fact that FOBT are banned and has been exacerbated by some smaller  being forced to close due to having an online presence.

not having

Two issues dj...

There are more shops per head of population here than the UK which knocks your competition theory straight away.

Secondly do you really not understand the elementary mistake you have made regarding the calculation of the margin?If you don't I'll leave you a chance to check out what the meaning of margin is before you imply anymore that I don't no what I'm talking about.

Pedantic and condescending,GL.

It is in no way pedantic or condescending.I made a reasonable and well informed reply to your post and it was you who attempted to belittle me by stating you were surprised at me.

It is patently obvious that you did not understand the correct way to interpret the figures and when corrected you were unwilling to admit your error and instead attacked the poster not the point of the argument.

Your 19.13 post rings true , patches , certainly that would be my observation on what I see nowadays in shops as against years ago . The FOBTS figures are staggering , think Lads state £950 profit per week per machine . My opinion on that is that it is licensed stealing and governments which tolerate it are only interested in creaming off their share via taxation .

TO VALUE a Hotel/TAB in Australia - the first question to ask is HOW MANY MACHINES on the premises !

Yeah catchme , a friend owned an hotel /Tab in Perth . Never heard how many machines they had .  He sold the complex some years ago for big bucks .

Went to a golf course in Brisbane with friends .  Noticed a lot of people going into a sub room , apparently they had 40 "pokies" in there .  No need for annual subs if they worked anything like the FOBTS here !

Russell Crowe bought an Aussie rugby League team , threw out all the machines apparently , fair play to him . Couldn't see the owners of the UK soccer teams doing that if that option existed , could you !

Many pubs now have full betting TV screens on their premises (transmitting live prices from their nearest local bookie)....
maybe only a matter of time before both businesses are under the one roof like those TAB's.


Thought Mr Lowry was working on sumfink near Two–Mile Borris.....can easily see Mr Trump reignite that matter soon.