Karsten Wenzlaff, Advisor
August 26th, 2025
Karsten Wenzlaff is a Crowdfunding and Fintech Expert from Germany. He is Secretary-General of Digit[...]
Financial Literacy Advocates Call for Stronger Safeguards as Online Gambling Participation Grows
March 2, 2026
Image: Unsplash/CardMapr.nl
Ontario’s regulated online gambling market is now measured in tens of billions of dollars. That scale has caught the attention of financial literacy advocates who see wagering not as entertainment alone, but as a financial behaviour. The question is simple: are the safeguards keeping pace with participation?
Online gambling in Canada is no longer a fringe activity. It sits inside the broader digital finance system you work in every day. Card networks process the payments and fintech firms build the rails while regulators try to get ahead of the game. Ontario offers the clearest picture: the province launched its regulated iGaming market in April 2022. Two years later, the numbers show just how quickly participation has grown.
Market Growth Outpaces Financial Safeguard Awareness
In its 2023–2024 fiscal year, Ontario’s regulated online gambling market recorded $63 billion in total wagers and $2,4 billion in gaming revenue.
The first year of regulation, from April 2022 to March 2023, saw $35,5 billion in wagers. The jump from $35.5 billion to $63 billion in one year represents millions of card transactions moving through Canada’s payment infrastructure.
When activity reaches that scale, it becomes part of the larger financial system conversation. Consumer advocates are no longer talking only about odds and advertising. They are asking whether financial guardrails are designed for a market processing tens of billions in digital transactions.
Payments Infrastructure Is Evolving Faster Than Policy
The payments side of this discussion rarely makes headlines, but it is central. Visa and other networks sit behind a large share of online gambling deposits. Operating within global compliance frameworks, they classify transactions and manage settlements.
Visa’s recent expansion of stablecoin settlement across Central and Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Africa shows how fast payment rails are modernising. The initiative allows settlement in USDC and operates outside traditional banking hours. That is infrastructure innovation at scale, and a good argument can be made that this is the future of money, the future of finance. Regardless of ones feelings about crypto, one cannot ignore the fact that it is now something people are starting to use in every day transactions, and not just on-chain speculation.
This signals something as simple as it is interesting: the rails are getting faster and settlement options are widening. When payment systems modernise at that pace, consumer safeguards cannot rely on static policy language written for a different era of finance. Policy needs to catch up, and fast. Policy hardly ever moves at the pace of innovation, and maybe its time that changes.
Canada’s National Financial Literacy Strategy 2021–2026 focuses on building financial resilience and improving how people navigate digital financial services. The strategy calls for clearer information, stronger consumer protection and behavioural design that supports better decisions.
Online gambling now sits inside that digital ecosystem. It involves credit products, payment authorisations and real-time account transfers. When $63 billion in wagers flow through regulated platforms in a single province, it becomes part of everyday financial behaviour.
Advocates argue that safeguards should mirror the scale of activity. Deposit limits, clearer transaction labelling and easier access to account history are not abstract features. They are tools that support informed use of financial products.
Visa Usage and Consumer Friction in Online Gambling
Most Canadian players fund accounts with familiar tools. Visa remains one of the most recognised options. Behind the scenes, gambling transactions are commonly coded under Merchant Category Code 7995. Some issuers apply additional scrutiny or decline those payments based on internal risk rules.
That friction pushes players to look for clarity. Many compare online casinos that accept Visa in Canada to understand where card deposits are supported and under what conditions. The comparison is less about brand loyalty and more about payment certainty.
From a financial literacy perspective, this is where awareness becomes practical. A cardholder may not know how transaction coding affects approval rates and they may not understand how chargebacks are treated in gambling contexts. As wagering volumes rise into the tens of billions, even small gaps in understanding can scale quickly.
Open Banking and Transaction Transparency
Canada’s open banking infrastructure continues to advance even before final policy implementation. The push is toward greater data portability and clearer consumer visibility over transactions.
Greater transparency has direct relevance here. When consumers can see where funds move and how categories are assigned, financial decision-making improves. In a market measured in billions of dollars, visibility is not cosmetic. It supports accountability across payment networks and platforms alike.
Safeguards as Infrastructure, Not Afterthought
Ontario’s $63 billion wagering figure is not a social commentary. It is a financial data point. That scale places online gambling squarely inside Canada’s digital finance system.
See: Fintech Ads At Super Bowl LX Reveal Trust Playbook
The takeaway here is straightforward. Growth in participation requires growth in clarity. Safeguards need to be built into the rails, not layered on after problems appear. The Fintech world is technology driven, and competition in the field sets the pace. Can regulation keep up?
The National Crowdfunding & Fintech Association (NCFA Canada) is a financial innovation ecosystem that provides education, market intelligence, industry stewardship, networking and funding opportunities and services to thousands of community members and works closely with industry, government, partners and affiliates to create a vibrant and innovative fintech and funding industry in Canada. Decentralized and distributed, NCFA is engaged with global stakeholders and helps incubate projects and investment in fintech, alternative finance, crowdfunding, peer-to-peer finance, payments, digital assets and tokens, artificial intelligence, blockchain, cryptocurrency, regtech, and insurtech sectors. Join Canada's Fintech & Funding Community today FREE! Or become a contributing member and get perks. For more information, please visit: www.ncfacanada.org
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