Press Room
Addictions: AGIC, data from the Report to Parliament confirm the urgency of effective rules. The underground market grows where there is no legal barrier.
AGIC, the association bringing together the main concession operators in the public gaming sector, expresses strong concern over the data contained in the 2026 Report to Parliament on addiction, which documents an increase in minors’ involvement in gambling — a phenomenon that is by definition illegal, given the ban on access for minors — and a broader spread of behavioural addictions, from digital addiction to online and land-based gambling.
The numbers are clear: according to the Report, in 2025, 60% of students gambled at least once in the previous year, with the share of “at-risk” and “problematic” profiles increasing compared with 2024. These are figures that AGIC has no intention of downplaying: they confirm that the problem exists, affects increasingly younger age groups, and requires concrete responses.
Precisely for this reason, the Association reiterates a distinction that the Report itself effectively confirms: underage gambling is, by definition, a phenomenon that takes place outside the legal perimeter, often through channels lacking effective age and identity controls.
I-Com, Schettino (AGIC): “Illegal market increasingly aggressive. Speed up the reorganization and keep the 80 million in the Budget intact.”
“We are not operating within a perfectly sealed perimeter. The external variable is the aggressiveness of the illegal market, driven by technological evolution, which is increasingly penetrating the legal market.”
This was underlined by Gennaro Schettino, president of AGIC, during the I-Com conference.
Gambling: the industry’s fight against the illegal market
The regulated gambling industry plays a key role not only from an economic perspective but also for its social and regulatory implications, as it represents a significant component of the national economy: in 2024, net expenditure reached €21 billion, while tax revenues exceeded €11 billion.
Gaming: the challenge against the illegal market
Yesterday morning, at the Hotel Nazionale in Piazza Montecitorio, the event “Legal Market and Public Gaming: The Role of the Industry”
Legal gambling: €12 billion in tax revenues
Legal gambling generates around €12 billion per year in tax revenues. In 2024, net expenditure amounted to €21 billion.
“Gaming is an industry, united against illegality”
An industry that in 2024 will provide more than €11.3 billion in tax revenues, against a net player expenditure of €21 billion, equal to 13.7% of the total wagers collected (€154.5 billion).