Bitcoin, Libra and The Online Casinos of the Future

As of yet, there has not been mainstream adoption of cryptocurrency at online casinos. Yes, there are some niche operators out there that might allow you to deposit with Bitcoin, but the big operators in the casino industry have really shied away from crypto. The reasoning behind this has nothing to do with behind the curve. In fact, the casino industry is usually at the forefront of payment technologies. Rather, it’s to do with logistics.

Consider how the casinos of today market themselves: At its base level, they are saying “come and play with us, you can win big money”. For example, right now you could log in and play the Fairest of Them All slot at a top UK casino. One of the draws of this game is that it has a progressive jackpot. At the time of writing, that jackpot stands at £628,072.36 (around 78 BTC) and is growing every second. There are loads of cool features and ways to win big with the game, but the ever-increasing jackpot stands taller than the rest.

Developers handle the Jackpots

However, the responsibility of paying that jackpot does not lie with the casinos, but the software developer (Ash Gaming/Playtech) that created it. Moreover, the developers are the manager of that money, because those jackpots are funded by taking a small percentage of each wager and paying it into the pot. The jackpot will trigger randomly and award the big prize to one player. That player could be in the UK, New Zealand, Canada – anywhere with online casinos that host the game.

For the same experience in crypto, the logistics can become a bit difficult. There is, of course, the question of harmonization of the legal issues. Top casino games and operators are global products, and you can envisage an issue if a national government takes issue with crypto. Regulation looks like it is on the menu in the world of crypto, certainly if the noises coming out of the White House are to be believed.

Volatility Still an Issue

There is also the problem with volatility. The worst feeling as a casino player (apart from losing) is when you learn that a winning prize is not as good as you thought it would be. Crypto traders will be well aware that the price can drop suddenly, like with the dramatic 25% price drop we saw in a 24-hour period just before Christmas 2017. It’s perfectly possible that the value of your prize drops 5%-10% in the matter of a few hours. Even if the price of Bitcoin goes up, there are still issues. Would the payout be calculated at the time of the prize awarding, or would it reflect the price of Bitcoin after processing has been complete?

It will be interesting to see where Libra – Facebook’s new crypto coin – will fit into all this. It too got a frosty reception from the Trump Administration and US lawmakers recently, but the push to make the coin more stable than rival cryptocurrencies will surely be attractive to the online casinos of the future. Facebook doesn’t seem to have the same aversion to gambling as Google famously does, so it won’t be surprising to see some sort of push to partner up with the casino industry.

In the end, whether its Bitcoin, Libra or something else in the wide world of crypto, the casino industry will have to establish a code of practice and settled norms to make it work. That feels like it’s a few years away, but it will surely be accelerated if we continue to see mainstream pushes for adopting crypto elsewhere.