Revolution in the air
CFTC chair seems set to change the rules of the game
Pham eyes sports-based events contract rule changes.
In +More: Light & Wonder’s Oz court win.
Guernsey and Alderney receive Moneyval clean bill of health.
Thai opposition rails against governments gambling plans.
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Game changer
Overturning the tables: The US derivatives regulator wants to remove legal barriers that prevent it from regulating sports-based events contracts as financial products. However, experts say more complex jurisdictional issues lie in wait.
New attitude: The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) is on a mission to reverse course on all things Biden-era, and wants to push through legislative changes that require public outreach under law.
Acting chair Caroline Pham stuck the knife into the previous administration, calling its approach legally shaky and anti-innovation.
The agency is holding a public roundtable in the coming weeks to help develop a “common sense” regulatory framework that will include sports-related event contracts.
“Prediction markets are an important new frontier in harnessing the power of markets to assess sentiment to determine probabilities that can bring truth to the Information Age,” Pham said.
“The CFTC must break with its past hostility to innovation and take a forward-looking approach to the possibilities of the future.”
Standing in the way of control: As part of the consultation, the agency, which is the smallest of the US federal financial regulators, will outline issues blocking its path to be the main supervisor for sports-based events contracts.
This includes regulations on the books it wishes to incinerate, ongoing litigation, ongoing probes and lobbying by other CFTC-regulated firms that the status quo should remain.
That’s the thing: The roundtable has been taken as a positive within the nascent sector that the CFTC may loosen what it can, but some unilateral barriers will not budge easily, if at all. Experts say ongoing litigation surrounding event contracts based on sports, and if they should be considered “gaming” under federal law, could be a stumbling block.
Existing legal interpretations, state regulatory authority over gaming and potential constitutional issues such as federal preemption and tribal sovereignty will all come into play.
“The trapdoor under sports contracts isn’t going away just because of a roundtable,” said Christopher Gerlacher of Prediction News, noting Pham has consistently maintained gaming belongs to state regulators.
Industry analyst Chris Grove added that, while the CFTC appears to be expanding the scope of prediction markets, immediate policy changes remain uncertain.
“Whether that translates to the CFTC immediately and proactively removing every legal barrier to prediction markets adding sports to their rosters is a separate question,” he told C+M.
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+More
Light & Wonder’s share price was up 10% in early trading on Monday on developments in relation to the Dragon Train legal action brought by rival Aristocrat.
A court in Australia has denied Aristocrat's request for an interlocutory injunction and the team at Macquarie said that, as a result, its customers in Australia are not parties to the Aristocrat litigation.
This puts paid to the idea that the 10,000 Dragon Train games currently in use within Australia might have been the subject to an injunction.
The Illinois Gaming Control Board has issued a cease-and-desist request to offshore iGaming operator Bovada and sent a similar warning to DFS+ operator PrizePicks.
The Merkur Group was awarded its casino license fairly and squarely, the Hanover Administrative Court ruled, following a lawsuit in Germany brought by the previous holder.
Iowa regulators have awarded Linn County Gaming Association a gaming license for its proposed $275m Cedar Crossing Casino and Entertainment Center project despite some 11th hour objections.
The Government of Western Australia has pushed through new enforcement powers and penalties as part of a regulatory overhaul triggered by a damning probe into a major Perth casino and the corruption that had damaged the venue.
India is mulling a new regulatory framework that will cover online gaming, gambling, betting and lotteries, as per local media.
A Belgian couple is suing publisher Riot Games over the legality of its enormously popular free-to-play League of Legends, which they claim is in violation of gambling laws in the country through its use of loot boxes.
FanDuel said that during the NFL Season just gone, nearly half of its customers, or ~3.5 million, reviewed their play activity using My Spend, a personalized responsible gaming dashboard. The company said it was also expanding efforts to leverage technology to enable early intervention when at-risk behavior is identified, with new initiatives to be announced in 2025.
High 5 Games has been ordered to pay $25m to former players following a Washington state court ruling. A class action lawsuit from former players alleged High 5 operated casino-style sweepstakes games through the usage of virtual chips purchased with real money, which could be used to extend playthroughs.
What we’re reading: Gambling operators are allegedly tracking and sending data to social media and technology company Meta without the consent of users, according to The Guardian. The data is reportedly being used to specifically target online gamblers with advertisements for online gambling on Facebook.
Alderney and Moneyval
An AML win: The States of Guernsey, which includes Alderney, was quick to hail the clean bill of health given by Europe’s anti-money laundering team of inspectors as a “highly successful outcome.”
Among the conclusions, the Moneyval evaluators found, with regard to risk understanding and the prevention of terrorist financing, Guernsey and Alderney met a standard only seen in four other jurisdictions worldwide.
They also confirmed the bailiwick has a very full and very contemporary set of regulations relating to AML, CFT and proliferation financing.
They added that these were “very well understood and communicated” by both its agencies and by the public sector.
A first: Notably, this is the first time a jurisdiction with point-of-supply online gambling has completed an evaluation without greylisting.
Malta was grey listed in 2021-2022, Gibraltar between 2022-2024 and the Isle of Man in 2016 and is still short of one FATF recommendation.
Remark worthy: Included within the evaluation is the Alderney Gaming Control Commission, which, alongside the Guernsey Financial Services Commission, was praised by Moneyval for undertaking “abundant and remarkable” training and outreach initiatives to ensure their reporting entities met their AML/CFT obligations.
The team added that no “fundamental improvements” are required to the bailiwick regime.
"We are gratified that Moneyval found the AGCC and its private sector operators to have a good knowledge and understanding of AML and CFT risks,” said Andrew Gellatly, executive director for the Alderney Gambling Control Commission.
“The AGCC bespoke supervision with only a relatively small number of licensees, but Moneyval recognised that it is well supervised, with robust controls in place at our reporting entities,” he added.
Gellatly went on to say that the Moneyval process can be “challenging for smaller jurisdictions” where resourcing with experienced and knowledgeable staff can be difficult.
“But we are pleased that this evaluation found the AGCC is well prepared,” he said.
“It is a very good report and Guernsey comes out very highly by any international comparison that can be drawn, particularly as this was the last evaluation in the fifth round and expectations have certainly been raised during that process.”
What is Moneyval? Also known as The Committee of Experts on the Evaluation of Anti-Money Laundering Measures and the Financing of Terrorism, Moneyval is a monitoring body of the Council of Europe and an associate member organisation of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF).
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Thai opposition
Red light: Former Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva has criticised the Thai government's plan to legalize casinos and online gambling in Thailand, saying doing so would worsen social problems associated with the activity.
According to a report in the Bangkok Post, Vejjajiva told attendees at an event that the plan to allow for resort casinos was “dangerous.”
He added that the possibility of online gambling being tagged on to the legislation would have a “negative impact on society, by increasing household debts and, consequently, crime rates.”
Green light: Recall, the Thai government said in January it would begin initial discussions on the push to legalize online gambling, according to Deputy Prime Minister Prasert Jantararuangtong.
That followed the publication of draft proposals for the licensing of casinos within the country issued last August.
The proposals were given the green light by the Thai cabinet in January.
Amber light: Vejjajiva said the government’s reasoning for allowing casinos was it would enable it to collect revenues from licenses and taxes as well as boost employment and attract tourism.
“But we have to weigh the benefits and risks carefully," he added.
He said he did not think legalised casinos would benefit Thai workers because in the end migrant workers from neighbouring countries were most likely to be recruited to work at such complexes.
Events calendar
Feb 26: Regulatory and compliance track, SBC Summit, Rio de Janeiro
Mar 10-13: Regulating the Game, Sydney
Mar 12-13: Next: NYC 25, RG Hub, New York
May 8-9: Leaders in Compliance Conference, Frankfurt
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