People’s Deputy and Deputy Chairman of the Finance Committee Yaroslav Zheleznyak spoke about the increase in tax revenues from the gambling business in 2024. He also named the amounts that Ukrainian citizens spent to replenish their gambling accounts — in December, about UAH 20 billion was invested in «gamble».
People’s Deputy and Deputy Chairman of the Finance Committee Yaroslav Zheleznyak spoke about the increase in tax revenues from the gambling business in 2024. He also named the amounts that Ukrainian citizens spent to replenish their gambling accounts — in December, about UAH 20 billion was invested in «gamble».
Zheleznyak pointed out that the taxation of the gambling business has a growth trend in annual terms. According to him, the «gambling industry» paid UAH 200 million in taxes in 2021 and UAH 730 million in 2022. In 2023 and 2024, tax revenues already amounted to UAH 10,430 million and UAH 16,990 million, respectively.
«The bad news is that the tax burden has decreased overall. This is as a percentage of top-ups (so since legal top-ups are growing, you see more tax dynamics). But this means that evasion schemes remain. They are just more complicated,» the MP wrote.
He also said that on average, Ukrainian citizens spent UAH 12.7 billion per month on replenishing their gambling accounts from January to November 2024. The largest amount of spending fell on December — then at least UAH 19.4 billion was spent per month.
«This is what we only see legally. Not everything is lost (something is returned as a win). But in general, it is certainly a sad fact during the war that people spend almost 20 billion on this type of entertainment…», Yaroslav Zheleznyak commented on the data.
Earlier, the head of the Verkhovna Rada Tax Committee, Danylo Hetmantsev, noted that in 2024 the gambling business paid almost UAH 17 billion in taxes, which is 63% more than in 2023.
Last year, it was reported that the gambling business in Ukraine earned approximately UAH 55 billion in 2023. This is almost 30 times more than in 2022.
We will remind that in late March, a soldier of the 59th brigade, Pavlo Petrichenko, wrote about the «gambling epidemic» in the Armed Forces of Ukraine and initiated a petition on the website of the Office of the President of Ukraine to restrict the work of online casinos. It quickly collected the 25,000 signatures necessary for consideration. On April 15, Pavlo Petrichenko gave his life defending Ukraine from the Russian invasion near Avdiivka, Donetsk region.
Subsequently, President Volodymyr Zelensky instructed the head of the SBU, the State Special Communications Service, the Ministry of Digital Affairs, and the Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council to collect analytics on online casinos and their impact on part of society.
