Category: News

The VPF will be created through the Remote Gambling Act which comes into force in April 2021.

Three agencies have now been tasked with fulfilling three aims of the fund: the Human Assistance Network for Daily Support (HANDS), ZonMw, and The National Healthcare Institute.

The Remote Gambling Act has three key objectives for preventing and treating problem gambling using VPF funding.

It aims to facilitate the anonymous treatment of gambling addiction, support research into prevention and treatment, and create a national support service for problem gamblers and their loved ones.

The National Healthcare Institute will implement an anonymous online treatment service, designed offer remote and discrete services to problem gamblers.

ZonMw, a government body which finances health research, will be tasked with coordinating gambling addiction research.

Finally, HANDS is to establish the national support which will come into effect from 1 October 2021. That date, six months after the Remote Gaming Act comes into force, marks the first the day operators can legally offer their services in the Netherlands.

The expanded permit will allow EveryMatrix to cater game content for online casinos operating in the British market, via Spearhead.

Spearhead will now make available its portfolio of titles to operators and also add new titles focused on British players.

The gaming development business creates its games using the EveryMatrix RGS Matrix remote gaming server.

“The team here at Spearhead is dedicated to making the studios’ games widely available in Europe and beyond,” Spearhead managing director Mathias Larsson said.

“We’re excited to get into the UK market and I’m looking forward to making new business connections with operators looking to source exciting titles for their players.”

In the letters, the APPG expressed “deep concern” about these sponsorships. It cited examples including Channel 5 soap Neighbours, which is sponsored by Entain brand Gala Bingo.

“Gambling companies are sponsoring programmes which seek to glamorise gambling with the aim of targeting women and young people and encouraging them to gamble,” the APPG said. 

“We are very concerned that television companies are promoting gambling – we have ourselves seen first-hand the harm and devastation that gambling can cause to young people’s lives, families and communities.”

The APPG added that this was especially important during lockdown measures imposed to limit the spread of the novel coronavirus (Covid-19), as children were more likely to be at home during the daytime and therefore to see these gambling advertisements.

Alongside its members, the group said that 52 “experts by experience” had also called for “urgent action”.

The APPG has previously called for an end to all gambling advertisements in a report published in June 2020. Other recommendations included a ban on online in-play betting and an end to VIP schemes.

The loan will raise $300m, while the notes offering will have an aggregate principal value of $200m.

The notes have been priced at 103.25% of the principal amount, or $206.5m. The loan’s interest rate is set at two percentage points above the London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR), a global interest rate standard.

Read the full story on iGB North America

The operator said its performance was driven by a combination of sustained and elevated levels of trading from existing clients, as well as continued high levels of client acquisition, with a record 230,100 clients active in Q3, up 60% year-on-year.

Over-the-counter (OTC) leveraged revenue was 57% higher at £210.5m in Q3, while exchange traded derivatives revenue was up 40% to £5.4m. However, the most significant growth came within IG Group’s stock trading and investment, where revenue rocketed 619% to £14.4m.

Breaking down this performance further, IG Group said revenue from operations in core markets reached £192.7m, up 67% year-on-year, while the total number of active clients in these market reached 191,700.

Other revenue came from its ‘Significant Opportunities’ portfolio, where revenue was up 55% to £37.6m, largely driven by a 50% rise in active clients to 40,100.

IG Group did not disclose any further details of its financial performance in Q3, but chief executive June Felix said that the operator made progress towards delivering on a number of its strategic goals during the quarter.

“The continued performance from the Significant Opportunities portfolio has been remarkable, and we anticipate substantially achieving the revenue target of £160m one year ahead of plan,” Felix said.

“The group is also continuing to grow the size of its high quality and loyal client base which represents a long-term asset to the group.”

In terms of its year-to-date performance, group revenue in the nine months to 28 February was £647.1m, up 66% from £389.7m at the same point in the previous year.

OTC leveraged revenue was up by 61% year-on-year to £599.7m, while exchange traded derivatives revenue increased 51% to £17.7m and stock trading and investment 369% to £29.7m.

Core markets revenue hiked 64% to £533.2m, with 224,900 active clients, while Significant Opportunities portfolio revenue increased 77% to £113.9m, with 60,700 active clients.

“I would like to take this opportunity to thank our people for their continued hard work during the quarter,” Felix said. “Operationally, this has been one of the busiest periods in IG’s history, and our global workforce has responded with the kind of dedication, resilience and professionalism embedded in the IG culture.”

Meanwhile, IG Group also gave an update on its planned acquisition of brokerage and trading education platform Tastytrade.

Upon publishing its first-half results in January, IG Group revealed it had struck a deal to purchase Tastytrade for $1.0bn.

Tastytrade has two brands: media-focused Tastytrade, which offers education to traders about options and futures markets; and brokerage platform Tastyworks, which has 105,000 active accounts and makes up 1.3% of the entire US equity options market by trading volume.

IG Group said trading at Tastytrade was strong in Q3, with the Tastyworks arm accelerating its rate of active account growth in 2021 and reporting a 100% rise in the number of active trading accounts during February.

Tastytrade was able to grow its registrants by over 100,000 in the two months to the end of February to nearly one million.

IG Group has now secured certain regulatory approvals for the acquisition, with others pending, and hopes to complete the purchase in the first quarter of its 2022 financial year.

“Our planned acquisition of Tastytrade is progressing well and the outstanding client growth delivered in the period underlines the further, significant growth potential of this business,” Felix said.

“This accelerates our strategy to drive new sources of growth, while also expanding the group beyond its core OTC offering.”

Gross marketplace volume, meaning the total entry fees paid by users for contests hosted on Skillz’s platform, grew 80% to $1.59bn during 2020.

Total costs for the year came to $329.7m, with sales and marketing, general and administrative, and research and development costs accounting for $251.9m, $42.3m and $23.2m respectively.

This led to a loss from operations of $99.6m.

After a further $1.3m was lost in interest expenses and $21.4m in other expenses, net loss stood at $122.5m for 2020, compared to a net loss of $23.6m during 2019.

The fourth quarter saw the business bring in $67.7m in revenue, up 95% on the $34.7m earned in 2019, and 8% higher than expectations.

Gross profit for Q4 was $64.0m, up 95%. Net loss for the quarter was $44m following total costs and expenses of $111.0m, compared to a $9m net loss in Q4 2019.

Read the full story on iGB North America.

The concept of blockchain might feel a little intimidating, but in reality, it’s quite simple. 

Blockchain stores information or data, just like a simple database. The difference between the two is how the data is structured and stored. 

The data gets stored in fresh blocks where each block comes with storage capacity. Once this happens, it gets connected with the previous block containing data. And together, these blocks of data form the blockchain. 

Now that we have a basic understanding of how it works, let’s talk more about the type of data that blockchain stores. The data can be transaction records or information about tangible or intangible assets. These assets can include patents, intellectual property, copyrights, houses, office space or cars, for example.

The scope of blockchain in esports

1. Fraud elimination
The data is recorded once and is visible to all the network participants. This data not only helps eliminate duplicate entries but also helps enhance transparency which, in turn, can also help to eliminate fraud.   

2. More transparency
No one can alter the information that blockchain stores. When it is given incorrect information, it needs the correct information to reverse the mistake. And at the end of the day, both the correct and incorrect data are visible. This visibility enhances transparency and helps tournament organisers establish trust among gamers. 

3. High-end data security
Millions of computer systems that participate in the chain store the data in blocks. Hence, even if the data gets lost somehow, it can always be recovered. 

4. Automatic prize money transactions
Smart contracts help businesses set specific conditions on the blockchain. These conditions help to trigger automatic transactions. In esports, several conditions can be pre-set regarding prize money. Hence, the winners and runners-up can automatically get paid when the tournament gets concluded.   

Blockchain’s role in fraud prevention

The lack of standard authentication tools and identity verification processes often results in security breaches through identity theft and card fraud.

This can lead to affiliate scams, bonus misuse, multi-accounting, account takeovers, chargebacks and even money laundering. 

These frauds take a toll on the business’ overall revenue, damage its reputation and cause wastage of funds. 

Fraud prevention tools help esports betting businesses overcome frauds and breaches effectively by securing their registration and authentication processes and providing them with high-end verification solutions. 

Some of these solutions include device fingerprinting, IP analysis and use of light, as well as stringent KYC checks, moderating sources of incoming traffic, implementing security questions and answers, as well as detection of suspicious activity and users. 

Fraud prevention renders several benefits to esports betting operators, including customer protection, minimised disputes, reduced regulatory fines, high-end security and increased credibility. 

Compliance and its impact on esports betting operators

There was a time when AML regulations, data protection, IT security compliance and financial transaction processing used to be the only areas of focus for igaming operators. But times have changed.

These days regulations are tighter than ever and have completely transformed the landscape of compliance, which continues to evolve.  

But what exactly is compliance? Well, it means aligning with certain rules and regulations, standards, laws and policies. 

Every esports betting platform starts small. And when things go well, businesses strive to expand to various other jurisdictions. To do so, they need to conform to specific jurisdictional laws. But there is a catch. 

If the compliance history and records of an online esports betting platform are weak, it can adversely affect the platform’s ability to acquire new licences as well as franchises. In short, we can say the success of an esports betting platform depends on its compliance history. In addition to this, the absence of a compliance programme also results in the revocation of the licence.  

Having a good compliance programme in place enables esports betting operators to conform to the various regulations and allows them to minimise the risk of regulatory or criminal action, helps them maintain a healthy reputation in the industry, and enables them to identify areas of concerns and make amendments. 

KYC for esports betting operators

Online platforms have always been more vulnerable to fraud than land-based platforms. The convenience they offer is one reason why they’ve become the new safe place for cybercriminals and money launderers. 

By its nature, esports encourages plenty of in-game purchases and transactions, and so esports platforms are attractive to criminal elements. Hence, KYC regulations have become stricter than ever. So, what is KYC? 

KYC enables esports betting operators to get vital data about their customers and ensure they are not involved or associated with financial crimes such as money laundering. Though KYC checks are carried out during the onboarding of a customer, due diligence is an ongoing process that monitors and controls any suspicious activity. 

KYC protects online esports platforms from fraud and enables esports operators to avoid severe penalties. It also helps operators keep their platforms safe and secure for legitimate customers while protecting their platforms’ integrity. 

However, an increase in costs also saw its net loss grow to $138.8m (£99.5m/€116.0m).

Total revenue for the 12 months to December 31, 2020 amounted to $278.5m, up from $63.7m in the previous year.

RSI did not publish a full breakdown of revenue, but noted its online casino operations outperformed sports betting by three-to-one in both New Jersey and Pennsylvania in 2020.

Online casino, which includes slots and tables but excludes poker, accounted for 76.7% of revenue in Pennsylvania last year, compared to 23.3% for sports betting, while casino was responsible for 72.1% of New Jersey, ahead of sports betting on 27.9%.

However, full-year operating costs and expenses rocketed by 379% year-on-year to $411.9m, with the cost of revenue being RSI’s main outgoing, jumping 480% to $190.9m.

Read the full story on iGB North America.

Revenue for the 12 months ended 31 December 2020 came to $49.2m, with this total made up predominantly of turnkey contracts with lottery operators. These contracts accounted for $32.3m of the supplier’s full-year revenue, up 87.1%. 

During the year NeoGames, via its NeoPollard Interactive joint venture with Pollard Banknote, powered the launch of the Virginia Lottery’s online offering. This proved to be the most successful roll-out for a US lottery to date, and also saw NeoPollard awarded a five-contract extension. 

The year also saw NeoGames and Pollard jointly agree an extension to their Michigan ilottery contract, running until July 2026. 

NeoPollard also rolled out the PlayAlberta platform for the Alberta Gaming, Liquor and Cannabis Commission (AGLC), the Canadian province’s first legal online offering. 

Outside of North America the supplier also extended its partnership with Czech lottery Sazka, to power its online lottery and gaming offering, until December 2025. 

While turnkey contracts comprised the bulk of full-year revenue, NeoGames reported a further $6.7m from the use of intellectual property rights, and $4.4m in fees from development services provided to the NeoPollard JV. 

Development and other services provided to Aspire Global, its former parent company, generated a further $2.4m in revenue, and royalties from game contracts brought in an additional $2.0m. The joint operation of Michigan’s ilottery accounted for the final $1.4m of revenue.  

Most importantly, however, NeoGames listed on the Nasdaq Global Market in November 2020, raising $81.7m through its initial public offering.

“2020 has definitely been transformational for NeoGames,” chief executive Moti Malul said. “The year also marks positive signs for the growth of ilottery around the world. 

“As regulators realise the potential value ilottery can provide to tightening governmental budgets, particularly during the uncertain times brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic, NeoGames continues to represent a trusted provider with superior technology and premium content driving the most profitable ilottery programs. 

Read the full story on iGB North America.

Of these 28,400 self-exclusions, 5,600 are from slot machines, of which 2,450 were for indefinite periods.

“We have noticed that self-exclusions on Slots Gaming have become more frequent, as more options have been available,” Veikkaus vice president for corporate social responsibility Jarmo Kumpulainen said. “However, we will not be able to analyze the situation thoroughly until after the exceptional conditions are over – the fact is that we currently only have ten percent of the machines up and running, due to the coronavirus.”

Meanwhile, 27,500 have self-excluded for online gaming, which some players having self-excluded from both slot machines and online gaming.

Of those who self-excluded, 77% are men.

This follows a series measures taken by the company to promote responsible gaming within the country.

One such measure is mandatory age verification on slot machines in public places, with the option for the player to set a self-exclusion on gaming for a fixed period of time. The operator also took a number of slot machines out of service.

Kumpulainen said: “We want to build an environment where we bear responsibility for those who are at risk of getting into trouble with their gaming. Compulsory authentication has brought us many new kinds of opportunities to do so.

“Veikkaus continues to work for safer gaming, and we are constantly planning diverse new solutions to help our customers manage their gaming better. We want to be a trailblazer of responsible gaming.”

Compulsory authentication came into affect in January 2021, before Veikkaus re-opened gaming venues in February.

According to their data, 28,400 customers have implemented self-imposed gaming bans, be that in retail outlets or online.