October 01, 2009

The gambling industry has not seen a major dent due to the financial crisis but has, rather, grown by 18 percent as compared to this period in 2008 and is an industry worth 9.8 billion zloty (2.3 billion euro) so far this year. A portion of the gambling sector is comprised of lottery tickets, bringing in 8-9 million zloty (about 2 million euro). However, the majority of the industry is made up of one-armed bandits.

The Ministry of Finance reports that, for the first half of 2009, gambling has turned a profit of 1.45 billion zloty (344 million euro).Most popular are automated games, also known as one-armed bandits. In the first half of 2009, these machines turned a profit of 4.37 billion zloty (1.04 billion euro) while gaming salons turned a profit of 1.35 billion zloty (320 million euro).