Toronto is the most populous metropolitan region in Canada and one of the biggest cities in the whole of North America. Located on the shore of Lake Ontario, the city and its surrounding region are home to approximately a quarter of the country’s population; however, in some ways, it may be the least Canadian of all cities: roughly half of the city’s residents were born outside of Canada, and its proximity to the United States makes it a popular tourist destination for Americans.
While Toronto may not be a favorite destination for gamblers, its proximity to major gambling sites makes it simple for residents to place wagers whenever the impulse strikes. And now that internet gambling is completely regulated in Ontario, playing casino games, poker, and other resort-style games from the comfort of your own home is simpler than ever.
The province regulates online gambling.
While Ontario wasn’t the first province to hop on the Internet casino bandwagon, it didn’t take long for the nation’s most populous area to realize that the cash potential was just too great to resist. PlayOLG.com was made accessible to gamers in Toronto and the rest of the province for the first time at the beginning of 2015. The objective was straightforward: by offering a locally regulated and licensed service to its players, the OLG wanted to provide a safer choice for consumers and retain the money that had previously gone to offshore sites in the province’s coffers.
PlayOLG has become a large-scale company during the last two years, providing a range of wagering options to attract the widest potential audience. The most logical match for the website was to sell lottery tickets online, enabling individuals to obtain tickets for large and minor prizes more efficiently.
However, this was merely the beginning of the portal’s surprises. Numerous casino games are supplied by renowned software companies like as IGT, Boss Media, and Bally Technologies. Slot machines, table games, casual games, and video poker machines comprise the whole selection of resort-style gaming. The possibility to wager on local horse races may also be added in the near future, and advertising efforts have successfully attracted a large number of serious players with attractive bonus offers for new deposits.
However, PlayOLG.com still faces considerable competition from the sites it was created to replace. While the government would prefer that everyone play on the state-run website, many gamblers continue to utilize the several foreign and international operators that welcome Canadian players. In recent years, this number has decreased as a result of the rising regulation of the sector in Canada, which has led several businesses to conclude they cannot risk operating here without a license, while others continue to do so. Even though these operators are circumventing the rules, Canadian players are permitted to place wagers there, since there are no regulations prohibiting them from doing so.
The decision of which site you play on is a significant one, and it may depend on what you want to gain from the experience. If you pick PlayOLG, you may be certain that you are playing at a site with local monitoring, and that any money you lose will go to the province government, as opposed to a foreign firm. On the other hand, there are a vast number of offshore operators with a range of games and possibilities not available via the OLG portal, and in certain instances, you may be eligible for even greater and more lucrative bonuses on these sites.
A robust and stable market
At this time, the future of Ontario’s gambling sector seems to be extremely secure. We don’t anticipate any substantial changes in the near future: the OLG will continue to regulate gambling as a whole, and because most kinds of betting are currently legal, there won’t be much of a push for new sorts of wagers. One conceivable exemption would be single-game wagering on sports, since now only multi-event parlays are permitted. However, it would be a federal matter, and the Trudeau administration does not support it.
Locally, Ontario has seen a decreased trend in lottery ticket sales, which has caused some concern: the lotto is a key income generator, and since young gamblers are particularly hesitant to participate, the long-term trend is concerning to many. The Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation (OLG) might target younger players, but this would not be without controversy: it may be difficult to promote to people who are barely old enough to gamble without encouraging underage gaming.