Figures released earlier in the week have shown that China’s lottery has posted its first annual sales rise in 18 months.
The country’s Ministry of Finance revealed that total lottery sales of RMB36.15b (US$5.28b) in the month of July had been recorded, up 10.4% from the same point last year and 7.5% higher than June 2020’s total.
The resumption of major sports activity following COVID-19 caused suspensions to play earlier in the year and have been cited as a major factor in the increase seen in July, with sports lottery sales rising 17.1% year-on-year to RMB20.7b, while welfare lottery sales also increased by 2.6% to RMB15.4b.
With this being said, sales over the first seven months of 2020 have seen the lottery register RMB160b, which sees its figures down roughly 35% when compared to the same period last year. Sports lottery sales are down 35.6% with welfare lotteries posting similar declines of 33.8%.
Despite the overall losses, the increase in sales seen in July has brought a halt to a continuous streak of annual declines which began in February 2019 and was merely accelerated this year as COVID-19 forced the suspension of sales altogether.
It is important to note that unlike a host of its Western counterparts, China’s lotteries were unable to offset its retail losses through the online medium due to the country’s online lottery project having been shut down in March 2015 following widespread fraud.
The online shutdown, which has been labeled as ‘temporary’, is yet to be given a recommencement date.
