Another year is about to come to an end, which means it’s time to take a look ahead and see what 2024 might bring. The last time I tried predicting the future was a couple of years ago and I didn’t do too badly, so let’s see if I can do it again:
Regulate, then regulate some more
Only if you have been living under a rock for the last few years will you not have noticed that our whole industry is getting ever more tightly regulated and this trend is going to continue. The developments in Curacao were a wake-up call for many that the times of “jurisdictions of convenience” are coming to a firm end. It’s not the jurisdictions themselves that are pushing this so much, but rather the financial system behind it all. The number of compliance roles will increase across the board (despite AI advances, see further down), to the joy of people who choose this career path and the dismay of UBOs having to pay for it all.
Another clear trend that will continue is the one of governments realizing just how much money they are missing out on by not having their own gambling regulations in place. This means the number of “pre-regulated markets” (as we call gray markets these days) will continue to go down and companies will have to increasingly apply for multiple local licenses if they want to maintain or grow their international footprint. More great news for the folks in compliance.
The return of a dead idea
Remember a thing called The Metaverse? Not too long ago it was sold to us as the next big thing, with companies pouring millions and sometimes even billions into the idea. Not much came from it and what we did see at conferences and trade shows hardly blew our socks off – but don’t count the idea out just yet. A number of projects are still alive, and we may see Metaverse 2.0 rise from the ashes of burned VC money. It will look a lot sleeker and very likely be more mixed reality than full on VR, and gambling companies will once again try and find value in the concept out of FOMO.
AI, AI and more AI.
There is no doubt that AI will continue to change our lives in general, and our industry in particular, in big ways. The topic is so big I could write numerous articles on it, so let’s keep it to a few bullet point predictions for Artificial Intelligence and gambling:
AI will change the way we interact with products. Conventional interfaces for things like sportsbooks will start to look different and we won’t have to search for the game or market we want to bet on. We will just tell an AI powered assistant what we want, and it will present relevant selections. It may also show us different odds depending on what it knows about us, and it could even go as far as building games for us in an instant. Just tell it what slot you want to play and watch it materialize in front of your eyes.
AI will continue to help with things like compliance, responsible gambling, and player personalisation thanks to its ability to digest large amounts of data. Chatbots will get even smarter and areas such as customer support will see increased automation and a decreased need for human workers. Being multilingual won’t be worth as much as it was until now as sophisticated real time translation tools make their ways into video calling and chat applications.
AI will also put a lot more firepower into the hands of players, something that hasn’t been the case before. This will open ethical, commercial, and regulatory dilemmas where lines will have to be drawn on what is considered fair and what is cheating.
Finally, all the “crypto experts” from 2023 will continue to be “AI experts” in 2024, with very few of them having any actual knowledge or proper qualifications. Those who do will be in hot demand and able to command huge salaries.
Crypto is here to stay
Crypto has certainly gone mainstream now, with some of the world’s biggest operators embracing it just as I predicted. This trend will continue and likely focus on core currencies such as BTC, ETH, and stable coins. P2P betting exchanges may emerge as significant growth areas, with companies like BetDex (based on the the Monaco Protocol) already making waves. Radix might grow into becoming the better Ethereum and will likely see its first gambling applications.
Governments will continue to push the idea of CBDCs, with sensible people continuing to vehemently object to it. Somewhere, someone is already thinking on how to integrate them into a gambling site.
BTC will continue to go up.
