Kambi CEO Werner Becher just delivered one of the most accidentally revealing interviews in recent igaming memory. Speaking at ICE, he essentially admitted that Brazil’s disappointing performance isn’t about regulation or market size—it’s because the company’s operator clients are getting hammered by professional bettors and can’t figure out how to manage their risk.

Let’s translate the corporate speak: « sophisticated bettors » means sharps. « Aggressive players » means arbitrage hunters and professional punters. And « more pressure on their margin » means operators are bleeding money because they never bothered to build proper risk management systems before rushing into South America’s supposedly golden market.

The Real Problem: Operators Priced for Recreational Players, Got Professionals Instead

Becher’s admission is damning when you strip away the diplomatic language. « An interesting learning for us is the number of casual punters is much lower in Brazil than [the rest of] South America and the number of very aggressive [bettors] is higher, » he told iGB.

Translation: We assumed Brazil would be full of mug punters placing parlay bets on football at terrible odds. Instead, we found a market packed with people who actually understand value and exploitable lines. Now our clients are getting destroyed because their trading desks can’t keep up.

Here’s the systems thinking nobody wants to acknowledge: Brazil has had a massive gray and black market betting ecosystem for years. Those weren’t casual recreational bettors—they were experienced players who’d been navigating offshore books and understanding betting markets long before regulation arrived. The legal market didn’t create demand; it just brought existing sophisticated bettors into the light.

Kambi and its operator partners walked into Brazil expecting European-style recreational traffic and got Argentina-level sharp action instead. That’s not a market problem. That’s a due diligence failure.

Market Size « Overstated »—Who Could Have Seen That Coming?

Becher also admitted that « estimates on the potential size of Brazil’s betting market were overstated. » No kidding. The entire industry spent two years salivating over Brazil’s 200+ million population and massive football culture, conveniently ignoring basic economic realities.

Brazil’s GDP per capita is around $9,500. Disposable income for betting is limited. The gray market was never as large as consultants’ PowerPoint presentations suggested. But admitting that before regulation would have hurt fundraising and investor pitches, so everyone nodded along to fantasy projections.

Now we’re six months into legal Brazilian betting, and surprise—channelization is lower than expected and the market isn’t printing money. The root cause isn’t regulatory friction or game authentication delays (though those don’t help). It’s that the industry collectively deluded itself about market fundamentals because Brazil sounded sexy on earnings calls.

South America Still Growing, But Expectations Were Delusional

To Becher’s credit, he’s not completely abandoning reality. South America represents about 20% of Kambi’s business, and markets like Colombia, Peru, and Argentina continue to perform. But notice what he’s not saying: Brazil was supposed to be the crown jewel, the market that would drive exponential growth across the region. Instead, it’s a margin-crushing disappointment.

« The strongest growing market [for us today] is South America, » Becher said. That’s technically true when you’re comparing it to a stagnant European market and a maturing North American market where Kambi keeps losing major clients. But it’s growth from a disappointingly low baseline.

Asia: The Next Hype Cycle Begins

Naturally, having learned absolutely nothing from overestimating Brazil, Becher is now « very bullish » about Asia as « the next big thing » in the industry. Thailand, Vietnam, Japan, and eventually India will supposedly deliver the growth that Brazil didn’t.

« I’m very bullish about Asia as the next big thing to come in our industry. Probably not in the next three years, » Becher said, helpfully admitting this is a long-term fantasy, not a near-term business plan.

At least he’s being honest about the timeline. But here’s the pattern: the industry always needs a new promised land on the horizon to keep investors excited. Five years ago, it was the United States. Three years ago, it was Brazil. Now it’s Asia. The story never changes—just the geography.

To his credit, Becher insists Kambi will only enter regulated markets, not chase gray market revenue. That’s the right position, but it also means most of these Asian opportunities are 5-10 years away, if they materialize at all. Japan’s casino process has been a masterclass in regulatory delay. India just cracked down on offshore operators. Thailand and Vietnam are longshots at best.

Meanwhile, Kambi needs to actually fix its business today.

The Client Exodus Nobody Wants to Discuss

Buried in this interview is the real crisis: Kambi’s revenue dropped 13.1% year-over-year in Q3 to €37.4 million, and the company has been bleeding major clients for quarters. LeoVegas and Kindred—two of its most significant partners—are moving to in-house sportsbooks.

Becher acknowledged these « near-term headwinds » but insisted Kambi would return to top-line growth « in the next couple of years. » That’s not a plan; that’s hope dressed up as strategy.

The industry pattern is clear: major operators eventually build or acquire their own sportsbook technology because they don’t want to pay platform fees forever and they want control over their own product roadmap. Kambi’s business model depends on mid-tier operators who can’t afford to build in-house or acquire alternatives. That’s a shrinking market.

Yes, new regulations create new clients. But if your largest, most sophisticated customers keep leaving, you’re not running a growth business—you’re running a churn-and-replace treadmill where you need new markets to open just to stay flat.

What This Really Means

The Kambi story is a microcosm of industry-wide delusion. Companies overpromise on new markets, underestimate operational complexity, and then act surprised when reality doesn’t match the pitch deck.

Brazil exposed fundamental weaknesses: inadequate risk management, poor market research, and business models built on assumptions rather than data. Instead of acknowledging these failures and fixing them, the industry is already pivoting to the next hype cycle in Asia.

Meanwhile, Kambi’s actual problem—losing major clients and struggling to replace that revenue—continues unaddressed. Talking about Japan and Thailand in 2028 doesn’t solve the 13% revenue decline happening right now.

The « sophisticated bettors » in Brazil aren’t the problem. They’re just exposing which operators and suppliers actually know what they’re doing versus which ones were riding the hype train. Kambi and its clients are learning an expensive lesson: you can’t bullshit the market forever. Eventually, someone calls your bluff—and in Brazil, it turns out that someone knows how to read betting lines better than you expected.

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