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When the UK government raised the remote gaming duty to 40% in April 2026, I received three messages from fellow bettors within the hour asking what it meant for their MLB wagering. The short answer: it does not directly tax you, the bettor. The longer answer is more interesting, because the duty increase is quietly reshaping which platforms serve the UK market, what odds those platforms can afford to offer, and why more bettors are migrating to offshore crypto sportsbooks where the duty does not apply. Remote gaming duty at 40% is the most significant fiscal shift in UK gambling policy in a decade, and its effects ripple through every corner of the betting ecosystem.
This article explains how the duty works, analyses its impact on operators and the odds they offer, and examines why the tax rise is accelerating the flow of bettors toward offshore crypto platforms.
How Remote Gaming Duty Works in the UK
Remote gaming duty is a tax paid by operators, not by punters. Any company offering remote gambling services to UK customers owes the duty on its gross gambling yield — essentially its revenue after paying out winnings. The UK online gambling sector generates approximately £6.9 billion in annual revenue, accounting for about 60% of the total gambling market excluding lotteries. That is the tax base upon which the 40% duty now applies.
Before April 2026, the duty stood at 21%. The jump to 40% nearly doubles the tax burden on operators. For a UKGC-licensed sportsbook earning £100 million in gross gambling yield from UK customers, the duty bill rises from £21 million to £40 million. That additional £19 million has to come from somewhere, and the options are limited: absorb it from profits (unsustainable for most operators), increase margins on the odds they offer (passed directly to the bettor), or reduce the scope of markets and products available to UK customers (reducing competition and choice).
The duty applies to all operators licensed by the UKGC, regardless of where they are physically based. A sportsbook headquartered in Malta but serving UK customers through a UKGC licence pays 40% on its UK-derived revenue. This is the key distinction: offshore crypto sportsbooks that do not hold UKGC licences and do not specifically target UK customers are outside the duty’s scope. They pay whatever tax their home jurisdiction imposes, which in Curacao or Costa Rica is typically a fraction of the UK rate.
Impact on Operators: Margins, Pricing and Market Exit
Paul Leyland at Regulus Partners has observed that by ignoring crypto, operators effectively push their highest-value customers into an unregulated ecosystem. The 40% duty intensifies this dynamic. Licensed operators facing a near-doubling of their tax burden must widen their margins to maintain profitability, which makes their odds less competitive compared with offshore alternatives.
The margin impact is measurable. A UKGC-licensed sportsbook that previously offered MLB moneylines with a 4% combined margin now needs to build in 5.5–6% to maintain the same post-tax margin. For the bettor, that translates to worse prices on every single bet. Over a full MLB season of 200 wagers, the cumulative cost of that margin expansion runs into hundreds of pounds — money that goes to the Treasury rather than the bettor’s pocket.
Smaller operators face an existential question. The duty is a fixed percentage of revenue, but the compliance costs of maintaining a UKGC licence — regulatory returns, responsible gambling tools, AML monitoring, affordability checks — are largely fixed. For a smaller sportsbook, those fixed compliance costs plus the 40% duty can consume most or all of the gross margin, making the UK market unprofitable. Some operators will exit, reducing the competitive pressure that keeps odds sharp for bettors.
The operators that remain will focus on high-volume, high-margin products — online slots and live casino rather than niche sports markets. MLB betting, which already receives limited attention from UK-licensed bookmakers, is likely to see further reductions in market depth, prop availability and competitive pricing. The duty incentivises operators to serve the most profitable customers, not the most analytically demanding ones.
Why the Tax Rise Pushes More Bettors Toward Offshore Crypto
The logic is simple and unavoidable. If UK-licensed sportsbooks offer wider margins because of the duty, and offshore crypto sportsbooks offer tighter margins because they are exempt from it, a rational bettor who cares about price will gravitate toward the offshore option. The 40% duty does not create this dynamic — it existed before the increase — but it widens the gap to the point where ignoring it costs real money.
Consider a concrete example. A licensed UK sportsbook prices an MLB moneyline at 1.85/1.95 (combined margin ~5.5%). An offshore crypto sportsbook prices the same game at 1.92/1.92 (combined margin ~4.2%). The crypto platform offers 3.8% better odds on the favourite and 1.5% better on the underdog. Over 200 bets at £100 stakes, the margin difference saves the bettor roughly £260 per season. That is not trivial — it is the difference between a marginal profit and a meaningful one.
The migration is not purely about price. Offshore crypto sportsbooks also offer deeper MLB markets — more props, more futures, more alternative lines — because they serve a global audience and can justify the investment. A UK-licensed operator who has just seen their tax bill double is not going to invest in building out obscure MLB player prop markets. They are going to focus on Premier League accumulators, which generate vastly more revenue per pound of development cost.
The irony is that the duty increase, designed in part to fund responsible gambling initiatives and reduce harm, may inadvertently push more bettors toward platforms where responsible gambling tools are weakest. The UKGC is aware of this tension — it is precisely why the regulator is exploring whether a regulated crypto pathway might be more effective than prohibition. But that conversation is moving slowly, and in the meantime, the 40% duty is accelerating the trend it was meant to counterbalance.
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Created by the "baseballbetb" editorial team.
