The European business (incorporating the financial results for the Emerging Markets Division) performed well in difficult economic conditions. The gross amount wagered (pre bonus adjustment) on sports increased by 0.8% to £1,184.0m (2010: £1,174.9m), generating gross gaming revenue of £118.9m (2010: £121.4m) down 2.1%. Underlying gross gaming revenue at constant currency increased by 1.5%.
Two of our largest markets Greece and Spain were affected by particularly challenging economic conditions and as a result we saw amounts wagered fall by 22% and 2% respectively. This impacted the number of sports actives, which fell by 10%. However, by providing markets to bet on every minute of every day we saw the number of sports bets placed rise by 4.1% to 78.9m (2010: 75.7m) and the number of bets per customer increased to 184 (2010: 159). Although the average bet size decreased marginally to £15.01 (2010: £15.51), yield per sports customer increased from £254 to £277.
Once again the European business produced an industry leading sports margin of 10.0% (2010: 10.3%). In:play betting in our European business accounted for 67% of the value of bets placed during the year and amounts wagered on live betting increased 9.0% year on year generating total NGR of £76.4m and equating to a gross margin of 9.7%.
The Emerging Markets division agai saw strong NGR growth up 56% driven by our Brazilian operation and our regulated South African operation.
| 2011 | 2010 | +/– | |
| Sports actives | 429,154 | 477,234 | –10% |
| Sports bets | 78.9m | 75.7m | 4.1% |
| Sports bets/active | 184 | 159 | 16.0% |
| Sports bet size | £15.01 | £15.51 | –3.2% |
| Yield per sports active | £277 | £254 | 9.0% |
| Casino and games bets | 581.4m | 499.6m | 16.0% |
| Casino and games bet size | £2.43 | £2.82 | –14.0% |
The continued increase in smart phone penetration has driven mobile usage to an average of around 15% in our more mature domains, with the take up varying widely from country to country. Those customers using smart phones tend to spend more across both online and mobile channels. Next year will see the introduction of Mobile Casino and Games, which is expected to incrementally increase mobile revenues by the end of the financial year.
Regulation offers new marketing opportunities in the mobile marketing space as Google's Pay Per Click, Apple's App Store and social media sites such as Facebook with their strong mobile following (44% of online users/350m mobile users) open up their doors to betting and gaming companies where they were previously closed.
Casino and games gross revenue fell by 1.5% to £47.5m (2010: £48.2m). Our industry leading product range led to a 16% increase in the number of bets, but the difficult economic conditions in markets such as Spain and, in particular, Greece caused a 14% decrease in the average bet size.
Poker gross revenue decreased to £17.7m (2010: £21.7m) in challenging market conditions, despite the closure late in our financial year of the US facing businesses of some of our competitors. Our casino and games and competitive poker product remain an essential part of our offering, creating a 'one stop shop' which has proven to increase customer loyalty.