The latest SpendTrend26 report from Discovery Bank and Visa confirms, from inside the financial system, the scale of South Africa's gambling boom.

Fifteen years ago, gambling in South Africa took place largely in casinos. In 2010, casinos held 84% of the market. Betting, which is wagering money on the outcome of an event such as a football match or a horse race, held just 10%. That picture has now been inverted. Betting overtook casinos during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Within betting, it is sports betting in particular that dominates. SpendTrend26 reports that online sports betting now accounts for the majority of all gambling spend in South Africa.

SpendTrend26 shows that sports betting is itself undergoing a second shift. It is moving onto the phone. Roughly 80% of sports betting activity takes place on digital platforms, and of South Africans who bet, according to the report, more than half do so exclusively online. In 15 years, gambling has gone from the casino floor, to the betting shop, to the phone.

The report draws on a survey of 1 000 South Africans earning more than R100 000 a year, and actively using a credit card. Three-quarters of those surveyed had placed a bet in the past year. Fifty-two percent bet online only, 15% in person only, and 7% use both. Just a quarter did not bet at all.

SpendTrend26 also documents a "watch and wager" effect around live sport. Local club matches have driven a roughly 50% rise in gambling spend. Around major sporting events, consumer spending on telecoms and data top-ups has risen by 119%, as bettors buy data to place bets in real time.

The Common Sense has previously reported that gambling already absorbs a significant share of spending in South African households. Statistics South Africa household expenditure data puts gambling at roughly 1.6% of total household spending, and more than half of all leisure spending. National Gambling Board figures put annual gambling turnover at around R1.5 trillion, and gross gambling revenue at close to R75 billion in the 2024/25 financial year. The sector now accounts for roughly 1% of GDP, with millions of debt-strained or grant-dependent South Africans betting weekly.

This newspaper has also reported on how betting firms are accelerating the shift to mobile betting by rolling out data-free apps that remove the last financial barrier to entry for the country's poorest households. The World Health Organisation has warned that gambling drives mental illness, suicide, and poverty by diverting household spending from essential goods and services, and that it contributes to family violence, child neglect, financial distress, and income-generating crime.

Last year, the National Treasury proposed a 20% national tax on gross gambling revenue, expected to raise more than R10 billion.

As this newspaper has argued, the betting industry is an organised system of human degradation. The SpendTrend26 data confirms how far and how fast it has spread. As betting has moved from the casino floor, to the betting shop, and now to the phone, its reach has expanded to include a significant portion of low-income households, where it absorbs a troubling share of already-strained spending.

The Treasury's proposed tax is a necessary step. On the evidence of these numbers, it will not be sufficient. More decisive action will be needed to curb an industry whose growth has already outrun the country's policy response to it.