Month: June 2022

The case related to the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (IGRA), which allowed federally recognised tribes to offer certain games like bingo – known as Class II games – in states that “permi[t] such gaming for any purpose by any person, organisation or entity”. 

Meanwhile, typical casino games such as blackjack or slot machines may also be offered by a tribe if it negotiates a compact allowing for Class III games to be offered. These negotiations, IGRA mandates, must be “in good faith”.

In 2016, the tribe then began offering electronic bingo, “on the view that IGRA treats bingo as a Class II game for which no state permission is required, so long as the state permits the game to be played on some terms by some persons”.

However, Texas attempted to shut this operation down. The United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ruled it could shut down the operation because Texas’ bingo regulations did not permit electronic bingo games similar to those the tribe had offered.

This was then appealed by the tribe, and ultimately considered by the US Supreme Court. 

The court noted that Texas acknowledged it did not “prohibit” bingo, and instead allowed it for charitable purposes.

“Instead, the state admits that it allows the game “according to rule[s]” that “fix the time,” place, and manner in which it may be conducted,” it said.

“From this alone, Texas’ bingo laws appear to fall on the regulatory rather than prohibitory side of the line,” it added.

However, the state argued that its rules mean that bingo is prohibited unless it meets certain conditions.

The court, however, rejected this interpretation.

“In Texas’ view, laws regulating gaming activities become laws prohibiting gaming activities—an interpretation that violates the rule against ‘ascribing to one word a meaning so broad’ that it assumes the same meaning as another statutory term,” it said.

The state also pointed to the the Ysleta del Sur and Alabama and Coushatta Indian Tribes of Texas Restoration Act of 1987, in which the tribes’ federally recognised status was restored.

This law includes a note, in which the tribe announced its opposition to Texas’ legislative efforts to have its gaming laws apply on tribal lands. In addition, the tribe revealed its intention to prohibit gaming on its reservation.

However, in a 6-3 decision, the court sided with the tribe. Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote the majority opinion for the court, with the backing of Sonya Sotomayor, Stephen Breyer, Elena Kagan and Amy Coney Barrett.

Gorsuch noted that the case was similar to California v. Cabazon Band of Mission Indians, a 1987 case where the court ruled California “regulated rather than prohibited” bingo. The ruling in this case was ultimately key in the creation of IGRA to define the laws around tribal gaming more clearly.

“For us, that clinches the case,” Gorsuch said. “This court generally assumes that, when Congress enacts statutes, it is aware of this court’s relevant precedents.

“And at the time Congress adopted the Restoration Act, Cabazon was not only a relevant precedent concerning Indian gaming; it was the precedent.”

The court added that this ruling did not give free rein to tribes to offer any games they wished.

“None of this is to say that the Tribe may offer any gaming activity on whatever terms it wishes,” it said. “It is only to say that the Fifth Circuit and Texas have erred in their understanding of the Restoration Act. Under that law’s terms, if a gaming activity is prohibited by Texas law it is also prohibited on tribal land as a matter of federal law.”

Regarding the recognition law, the court said IGRA was in fact “‘in accordance with’ the

Tribe’s resolution choosing not to apply Texas gaming regulations as surrogate federal law on tribal land”.

In a dissenting opinion, Chief Justice John Roberts disagreed with the majority’s ruling. Focusing on the recognition act, he said “the Tribe requested that the pending bill conferring federal trust status be amended to prohibit on the reservation all gambling as defined by Texas law”. 

As a result, he said that the case should not be treated like a standard one of prohibition versus regulation.

The lottery also published in full a letter it originally sent to the Belgian government in October 2021 calling for tighter restrictions on marketing for non-lottery operators.

The government announced a gambling advertising ban on 10 May, and it is set to go into effect towards the end of the year.

Under these rules, all gambling advertising would be illegal, with the big exception of the National Lottery – which is the largest single gambling advertiser, accounting for 40% of the total share.

The lottery originally wrote the letter to Secretaries of State Mahdi and De Bleeker on 1 October 2021, but stresses it was in no way involved in Minister Van Quickenborne’s proposal for royal decree banning gambling ads in the country.

The newspaper alleged that the lottery offered to pay an additional €30 million over three years in exchange for the ad ban – which it characterised as an attempt to restrict the competition.  

In response, the lottery said that rather than offering higher payments to the government if ads were banned, the government proposed higher payments, which the lottery said were impractical as long as private operators could continue to market their services.

“When the government asks it to pay a higher counterpart for its monopoly, the National Lottery finds it quite normal to draw the government’s attention to the fact that its monopoly has been seriously undermined in recent years by the arrival of a large number of private gambling operators subject to less strict rules, and who have a free hand due to the lack of regulation and enforcement of the rules in the field of casino games and sports betting.

“And on the fact that they are, moreover, also at the origin of the strong growth of the problem of gambling in our society.”

The all-cash sale was approved by shareholders during a general meeting in December last year and, in line with the sale and purchase agreement, is expected to complete on 30 June.

Gopher, a minority shareholder in Playtech, tabled its $250m (£208m/€239m) bid for Finalto in June last year. The Playtech board agreed to sell the business to Gopher in September of 2021.

“The completion of the transaction is a significant step in Playtech’s stated strategy to simplify the group and to focus on its technology led offering as a pureplay business in the high growth B2B and B2C gambling markets,” Playtech said.

Playtech initially put Finalto up for sale in March 2021 in order to focus on its core gambling business, but had been considering plans to divest it since 2019 due to poor performance.
In May last year, its board agreed to divest Finalto to a consortium led by Israeli private equity fund the Barinboim Group, in a deal worth up to $210m. However, in July of the same year, Gopher emerged with its counteroffer.
As a result, Playtech delayed its general meeting – where shareholders would vote on the Barinboim bid – at Gopher’s request, allowing the board to seek further information about the proposal.
The board asked the Hong Kong-based business a number of questions, largely related to its ownership, possible links to China and whether these factors could hinder regulatory approval of an acquisition.
While Gopher answered initial questions, Playtech said it required further clarity on some of its responses. After it did not receive additional responses, Playtech’s board announced that it would continue to support the Barinboim consortium bid and hold its general meeting where shareholders could vote on the deal.
However, despite the board’s approval, the majority of voting interest rejected the Barinboim offer. In total, shareholders representing 75.3 million shares voted for the deal. However, shareholders with 164.3 million shares – or 68.3% of total votes cast – voted against.
This meant that the agreement between the Barinboim consortium and Playtech was no longer valid, allowing the supplier to negotiate fully with Gopher. The broken agreement mean Playtech must pay the consortium $8.8m.
Despite skepticism from Barinboim, the supplier’s board agreed a deal to acquire Finalto.

The Gopher bid was initially linked with an offer from Aristocrat’s to acquire the Playtech business, as upon shareholders approving the Gopher offer, Playtech said that the bid “meets a key condition” of Aristocrat’s offer. 

However, Aristocrat’s proposed acquisition failed to secure enough shareholder backing to proceed. In total, 174 shareholders representing 56.13% of Playtech – or 140.5 million shares – voted in favour of the bid at a court meeting, while 54.68% did so at a general meeting. 

Both of these totals were well below the 75% threshold required for the merger to be approved. Shareholders representing 43.87% of the business voted against the deal. At least 75% of voting shares needed to approve the scheme if the 680 pence per share bid, which equates to a purchase price of around £2.70bn, were to proceed.

JKO Play had also been in talks over a possible offer to acquire Playtech, but withdrew from the process.Gopher also registered an interest in making a bid in November of last year but dropped out of the running a few weeks later. 

TTB Partners made an approach over a possible takeover in February, with Playtech having agreed to release TTB from certain restrictions to allow it to form and potentially make an offer.

Playtech said it had agreed to the request but warned that there was no guarantee this would lead to an offer. The tech giant also said it would likely be the case that any offer from TTB would be made in cash.

The restrictions placed on TTB – part of the City Code on Takeovers and Mergers – came as a result of its role in advising Gopher over its potential takeover offer for the business. 

The restrictions on TTB, which would have blocked it from making an offer itself, were due to remain in place for six months from the withdrawal date, through to 20 May. However, with these lifted, TTB was able to begin to form its own offer.

Playtech CEO Mor Weizer has declared his support for a possible bid, which must be submitted by 17 June.

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The approval all but clears the way for the acquisition to complete, with Crown expected to now lodge an office copy of the orders with the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), at which time the scheme arrangement for the deal will become legally effective.

Crown will also request that quotation of its shares on the ASX be suspended from close of trading today. 

Subject to the scheme becoming legally effective, Crown shareholders will be paid $13.10 cash per Crown share upon the implementation date of the scheme, which is expected to take place on 24 June.

This payment is in line with the terms of the acquisition offer, which is was approximately AU$8.87bn (£5.10bn/€5.87bn/US$6.12bn) and was accepted by Crown’s board in January this year after an earlier bid of $8,.02bn was rejected in March last year.

The initial offer came at a time when Crown was faced with a number of inquiries. In February 2021, Crown was deemed unsuitable to operate a casino in Barangaroo, Sydney, after an investigation uncovered evidence of money laundering in its facilities.

Later in the year Crown was also ruled as unsuitable to operate a casino in Victoria, with an investigation ruling Crown had engaged in “illegal, dishonest, unethical and exploitative” conduct.

The acquisition deal also required a series of other approvals in order to proceed, including from regional authorities in New South Wales, Victoria and Western Australia, all of which were secured in recent weeks.

Last month, the majority of shareholders in Crown Resorts voted in favour of the takeover. Of the 92.05% of shareholders that were present and voting were in favour of the deal, and 99.91% of the votes cast by shareholders backed the acquisition.

The statement was signed by Kshitij Aggarwal, the assistant director of digital media at the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting.

Aggarwal cited the disconnect between the current legal environment in which activities deemed gambling are illegal in the majority of Indian states, and the publication of advertisements for online betting.

These ads, he noted, were promoting an activity which was prohibited in most circumstances.

The government also made reference to what it termed “the significant socio-economic risk for consumers, especially youth and children,” as a factor in its decision. In addition, Aggarwal pointed to legal issues, arguing that current advertisements “do not appear to be in strict conformity” with Indian law.

Aggarwal stated: “In light of the above and having regard to the larger public interest involved, the print and electronic media is advised to refrain from publishing advertisements of online betting platforms.”

“The online and social media, including the online advertisement intermediaries and publishers, are advised not to display such advertisements in India or target such advertisements towards the Indian audience.”

Earlier this year, DSWV opened up a partner program for non-operators across the entire sports betting value chain, with the aim of helping the entire German sports betting industry speak with a single voice.

Kerberos specialises in money laundering compliance, providing solutions to the gambling and sports betting industries to ensure operators and other businesses in these markets are running in line with local and regional regulations.

“DSWV and its member companies stand for a reputable sports betting market that always meets compliance requirements,” Kerberos managing director Christian Tsambikakis said. “With our products and services, we provide the right tools. Together we can make the German gaming market even safer and innovate the regulatory framework.”

TrueLayer is a global open banking platform, offering companies secure access to financial data and the ability to offer real-time payments to customers.

“We provide companies in the sports betting market with an intelligent financial technology infrastructure,” TrueLayer’s country managing in Germany Sebastian Tiesler said. “As the leading industry association in Germany, DSWV is the central contact for us and represents the regulated German sports betting market.”

Dimoco is a licensed payment institute with expertise in carrier billing and paying via mobile phone. This system allows merchants to accept payments for digital and non-digital services and goods from customers in the European Economic Area (EEA) and worldwide. 

“The partnership with the DSWV brings our business in Germany another significant step forward,” Dimoco’s director of sales Bettina Sommer said. “With our solution, we can offer sports betting providers real added value by allowing them to benefit from a fast, secure and wide-ranging payment method.”

DSWV president Mathias Dahms added: “All three new partners enjoy an excellent reputation in the industry and deliver real added value to the sports betting industry with their products and services. They fit perfectly into our partner program, and we look forward to cooperation.”

Upon opening its non-operator partner program in January, DSWV welcomed an initial four members including payment provider Aircash, risk and identity services provider Crif, fintech business Okto and data provider Sportradar.

iGB Live! will take place on 5 – 8 July at the RAI, Amsterdam.

Witoldo Hendrich Júnior, chief legal officer of Brazil at Online IPS, said that iGB Live! is an opportunity for the industry to connect, and keep on top of fast-changing developments.

“Given the ever-changing and growing nature of the gaming sector, it is essential to stay updated on regulations globally and be familiar with the constant changes taking place in the industry,” said Hendrich. “iGB Live! allows us to stay on top of the changes and helps us provide the expertise our merchants demand from us as their payment service provider.”

Hendrich also said that the company is aiming to gain new partners at iGB Live! and enhance their collaborative reach.

“We also hope to meet potential new partners from having a presence at iGB Live! as collaboration is encouraged in this industry,” he continued. “With constant changes in the space, new challenges and increased regulatory pressures, it is important to work together.”

“As the organisers of iGB Live! said themselves, the goal is to ‘Connect. Converse. Convert’.”

Online IPS focuses primarily on the US, Latin America and Europe and is aiming to intensify its presence in these regions. Hendrich says that with iGB Live, Online IPS will be able to advertise its new processing solutions service.

“Though we are based in the US, we previously did not offer processing solutions in the region,” he said. “This is something that has now changed, and it is a service we are eager to share and offer to potential merchants attending iGB Live!”

He added that Online IPS holds iGB Live! in “high esteem”, viewing it as a “critical component” of the industry.

“Throughout the year we attend numerous trade events around the world, with iGB Live! being a recurring show we hope continues to be on our roster year after year,” said Hendrich.

“The sector certainly missed the in-person experience, evidenced by the number of attendees to conferences post-Covid, as well as the anticipation and eagerness felt throughout to schedule meetings, connect, and get back to business.”

This year’s edition of iGB Live! will take place between 5-8 of July at the RAI in Amsterdam. You can register here.

In his new role, Renaux will support the operator with its plans to launch further brands and enter more regulated markets around the world.

Renaux joins PressEnter after over nine years with Kindred, where he was most recently group director of delivery and portfolio management, following a spell as group head of commercial business development.

Prior to this, Renaux spent more than six years with Unibet Group, first serving as customer relationship manager for France, before progressing to become regional marketing manager and later program manager.

“PressEnter has grown at a tremendous pace thanks to the incredible team that it has in place,” Renaux said. “The organisation has everything that it needs to achieve its goals, underpinned by a clearly defined strategy for how to complete its mission. I will use my knowledge and experience to enhance the processes and strategies in place to ensure success.

“Of course, I will do this while making sure that we maintain the mindset of a start-up and that we use the intelligence of the team to take what we need from the corporate world without losing our identity as an agile, entrepreneurial, fun organisation made up of brilliant people.”

PressEnter chief exectuive Lahcene Merzoug added: “Our plans to become a top tier operator are as ambitious as they are clear. We know that to achieve our ultimate goal we need a team of top talent and in Nicolas, we have someone that is a professional and cultural fit.

“I look forward to working with him closely as we continue to establish the business as a major player in the industry.”

The appointment comes after PressEnter, the operator behind websites such as 21.com and RapidCasino, this month launched in Romania after securing the required approval from the country’s gaming regulator.

The ads were broadcast across TV and radio in March this year.

One of the ads, which was shown on TV, depicted a man gambling on Paddy Power’s Wonder Wheel game on his phone. The man’s partner asked him whether he thought she would look like her mother someday, to which he replied “I hope so” while continuing to gamble on his phone.

A voice over then played, which said: “So no matter how badly you stuff it up, you’ll always get another chance with Paddy Power games.”

Two complainants criticised whether the ad showed someone so immersed in gambling that it took priority over normal life. Another complainant challenged the voice over, and whether this encouraged irresponsible gambling behaviours.

The ASA upheld these complaints, agreeing that the ad had depicted gambling as “taking priority” over family life and that the “stuff it up” reference “gave the impression that the decision to gamble, even in the face of repeated losses, should be taken lightly.”

The second ad, which was broadcast on radio, received a complaint for allegedly containing harmful references to Irish immigration in the context of Cheltenham 2022.

The ad said: “Cheltenham 2022 is underway, and we’ve already seen some cracking contests in the Cotswolds. Not to mention the biggest influx of Irish since London in the 1980s.”

The complaints questioned whether this was likely to cause serious offence, while one complainant believed that this could be a reference to IRA attacks. The same complainant questioned whether another part of the ad, which stated that the British trainers would “put the Irish trainers back in their little green horse boxes”, was a derogatory reference to immigration.

The ASA did not uphold these complaints, stating that the ad was not clearly referencing the IRA and was instead focused on the long-standing sporting rivalries between the British and the Irish.

A complaint about the third ad was also not upheld. It was broadcast on radio and depicted a man having a conversation with his potential father-in-law, wherein Cheltenham 2022 is referenced alongside a sexual innuendo.

The father also uses the term “my Olivia” to describe his daughter.

The complainant challenged whether the ad was degrading to women, both in terms of the innuendo and the use of “my”. The ASA did not uphold this, stating that the scenario referenced “the anxiety about saying or doing something inappropriate when meeting a partner’s family for the first time” and did not enforce gender stereotypes.