The Swedish betting operator has wrapped its 2025 win report in stories of million-euro payouts and support for horse racing, but the timing and emphasis also underline the argument it has been making in a widening fight over tax, channelisation and the future shape of the licensed market.
ATG’s latest year-end win report is framed as a celebration of jackpots, high odds and “life-changing” payouts. But in Sweden’s current gambling debate, it also reads as something more pointed: a reminder of the role the company says it plays in financing horse racing, rural employment and a broader public good.
The report highlights the biggest wins across horse betting, sport and casino, while repeatedly stressing the idea that ATG’s surplus ultimately benefits the racing industry. “Many winners. But the horses always win the most,” the report says. ATG is “not driven by any private profit interests,” it adds, and “all remaining profits go back to the horses.”
The operator has spent months arguing that horse betting should not be treated the same as online casinos when policymakers consider gambling tax and regulation, an argument also motivated by the financial pressure the company is facing. In its 2025 annual results statement, ATG said net gaming revenue fell by 2 per cent and the parent company’s result dropped from SEK 2.346 billion (€202 million) to SEK 2.099 billion (€181 million).
“Both the lower revenues and the increased gambling tax hit the return to our owners directly and thus weaken the financing of the horse racing sector. It is a development we take seriously,” commented Lotta Nilsson, chief financial officer and deputy chief executive.
A glossy report with a familiar message
The win report gives ATG further material to reinforce that line. According to the document, horse betting delivered 214 wins of at least one million kronor, equivalent to about €91,000 or more each. V75, a long-running pool betting product in which customers try to pick winners across seven races, accounted for 72 of them. V86 accounted for 54, while the newly launched V85, an eight-race version introduced in October, accounted for 57.
ATG also said more than SEK 2 billion (€183 million) went back to horses in 2025 and that, since 1974, the figure has reached almost SEK 60 billion (€5.5 billion).
Horse racing supports “breeders, trainers, tracks, jobs, events and a living cultural heritage,” argued former chief executive Hasse Lord Skarplöth, adding “either we continue to pretend that all forms of gambling are equal, or we tax according to actual risk and benefit.”
The fight over what consumer protection means
That position has put ATG sharply at odds with BOS, the Swedish Trade Association for Online Gambling, and much of the private online sector.
BOS argues that raising costs for licensed online operators risks driving gamblers to offshore sites with weaker safeguards. Last December, the association warned the government not to support ATG’s proposal for differentiated taxation. Gustaf Hoffstedt, BOS secretary general, said: “The higher the tax, the greater the risk that the consumer will choose unlicensed gambling, where neither gambling tax nor consumer protection exists.”
Sweden’s channelisation rate has made that divide more pronounced. In March, ATG estimated that 73 per cent to 84 per cent of gambling in the fourth quarter of 2025 took place inside the licensed market, still well below the state’s 90 per cent target. Tobias Melin, ATG’s chief analytics officer, said: “Channelisation is moving in the right direction, but there is still a long way to go to reach the state’s target.”
That leaves ATG’s win report looking less like a simple year-end celebration than a carefully timed statement of identity. At a moment when profits are under pressure, and the regulatory argument is becoming tougher, the company is marketing itself in Sweden as, above all, the financier of horse racing.
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