IGT separates gaming and lottery, Betsson in Finland, players don’t like Bonus Buy

International Game Technology has announced that it is separating its lottery and gaming divisions and also announced a merger with Everi Holdings in the process. The company said on Thursday that it will spin off its Global Gaming and PlayDigital units away from the business known as IGT and merge them with Everi Holdings.

Meanwhile, IGT will focus on lottery exclusively, hoping to strengthen the segment, which already accounts for half of its revenue, and which the company wants to further develop and close the gap with competitors. There will also be changes to the company’s listing on the New York Stock Exchange, with IGT changing its ticker, and Everi Holdings and the merged divisions using IGT ticker instead.

The deal is still subject to customary regulatory approvals which could throw a spanner in the works or cause hindrances along the way. As to the closing date, International Game Technology expects the deal to pass through by the end of 2024, or early 2025 at the outside.

BML Group, the parent company of Betsson, has reportedly become the first entity to be blacklisted in Finland. The company is said to have been put on Finland’s National Police Board blacklist, with 14 of the group’s brands named in the list.

This measure comes after Finland alleged and maintained in court that BML Group had targeted Finnish players by offering tailored and language-specific materials, including affiliate materials and marketing campaigns.

The allegation has been contested by BML Group, but a reported loss in court on February 19, 2024, has resulted in the blacklisting, with the seminal gaming company becoming the first to be logged into the country’s newly-created list designed to fight illegal gambling and cut access to those websites.

Problem Gambling and Industry Developments in Focus

The Nordics were much of the focus of this week’s attention, as Denmark announced that it had secured a court order to ban 83 illegal gambling websites. The Danish Gambling Authority confirmed that it would be stepping up its efforts to restrict illegal gambling in 2024, issuing two comprehensive bans a year, from its one ban hitherto.

This should add to the list of illegal gambling websites that have been cut off from the country with the help of Internet Service Providers. Play’n GO, one of the most popular suppliers of iGaming content and titles, surveyed in Sweden, petitioning players about what they thought about Bonus Buy.

Play’n GO said that the majority of players were opposed to the measure. Some 55% of players said that Bonus Buy has to be prohibited altogether, while 69% of respondents said that they would be in favor of a legal measure that does just that.

Sweden has said that it would consider enacting a credit card ban for the purposes of gambling. The announcement was met with disapproval from the Swedish Gaming Trade Association, which reminded the government that previous investigation into the issue – conducted by the government no less – indicated that a ban on credit card use would further defang the regulated gambling market, giving teeth to black market operations instead.

Australia in the meantime is courting a total gambling ads ban, with the country’s officials reportedly traveling to Belgium to meet with local gaming regulators in a bid to better understand how such a measure may be enacted for the benefit of consumers. The Oceanic country is keen to explore the possibility of rolling out a blanket ban on all advertisements to better protect consumers.

In the meantime, a new survey in the Netherlands discovered that a still significant chunk of young people, under the age of 24, are moderate-to-high risk gamblers. The exact percentage, according to a new survey, is 23%. The results are based on a survey conducted by I&O.

The Super Bowl may still have an illegal gambling problem, according to research Yield Sec conducted on behalf of the Campaign for Fairer Gambling. According to these findings, the February 12 game saw illegal bets outpace legal ones by a significant margin. Illegal bets amounted to $5.37bn, the study said, compared to just $1.4bn for the legal segment.

Now, these numbers seem a little exaggerated, but even if they are, there is still a substantial level of illegal gambling going down on some of the biggest sports events in the country. With March Madness almost upon us, regulators and lawmakers ought to take notice.

Casino Guru in the News and Industry Chatter

This week we have the opportunity to bring you the latest interviews with various people from the gambling industry. For one, we caught up with Yeva Avagyan, Head of Commercial at AffPapa, with whom we spoke about the upcoming iGaming Club Conference Malaga 2024, and the challenges that AffPapa seeks to address with each new event, creating value for participants and a place where their hard work may shine. We invite you to read up on the full conversation with Avagyan in our interview with her.

The latest episode of All Things Gambling, our webinar series dedicated to addressing important topics in the gambling industry, is now out. We spoke with Tracy Parker, the Director, of Standards and Accreditation and Interim Director, of the Centre for Advancement and Best Practice, who discussed the importance of both prevention and treatment in tackling the larger problem of gambling harm.

We had a similarly pleasant conversation with Vladimir Negine, CEO at St8.io with whom we discussed how targeted game aggregation matters. Negine argued that his company has significant experience in the industry and is aware of what not to build, pivoting towards innovation and meeting unique business needs instead, as well as bespoke and tailored solutions that are the result of close collaboration with clients. Our full conversation with Negine is worth reading in its entirety.

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