Gambling companies were among the top spenders in Sweden’s advertising market in 2016, despite lingering controversy over their access to the airwaves.

New figures released by Sifo Advertising Measurements in conjunction with Dagens Media show online gambling companies, including state-owned monopoly Svenska Spel, spending big on Swedish advertising platforms during the first 11 months of 2016.

In terms of television advertising spending, Malta-licensed online operator Unibet topped all gambling operators with an outlay of SEK 270m (US $30m), ranking fourth overall in terms of all industries and accounting for 1.5% of all TV marketing. Svenska Spel ranked fifth on the TV chart with a total spend of just under SEK 243m.

The data is in keeping with previous figures covering the first half of 2016, which showed gambling companies accounting for 10% of all Swedish TV advertising spending, up from 3% in 2013. Unibet also ranked highest among its gambling peers on the H1 chart.