Second bite
Another sweepstakes lobbying group emerges, led by VGW
Market leader acknowledges “rising interest” in the sweepstakes sector.
Kalshi taps Musk’s xAi.
The Dutch online gambling market is ailing – and not tipped to get any better.
UK releases more details of financial risk checks pilot study.
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Sweeps takes
Social mobility: A new player has entered the sweepstakes lobbying game. The Washington, DC-based Social Gaming Leadership Alliance (SGLA) has formed to shape future sweepstakes regulation.
Founding members include sweepstakes giant VGW (Chumba Casino, Global Poker, Luckyland Slots), B-Two Operations (McLuck, Hello Millions), Yellow Social Interactive (Pulsz), ARB Interactive (Modo Casino), Playstudios (MyVegas) and payment provider Nuvei.
Former US Congressman Jeff Duncan has been appointed executive director of the group, which said it would defend the “free-to-play” model and consumer access to online social games.
Here’s looking at you kids: The SGLA is separate from the Social and Promotional Games Association (SPGA), which laid the groundwork for voices inside the sweepstakes sector to be heard.
The SPGA has been active in fighting efforts from regulators in New Jersey, Louisiana, Montana, Connecticut, New York and other states legislating to restrict social casinos.
Regulators and tribal leaders have accused the platforms of providing illegal gambling services via a loophole.
SGLA members argue their games are free to play, age-gated, and already meet high standards of security and player protection.
Not going quietly: VGW CEO Laurence Escalante described the alliance as a response to both market growth and political pressure. “We recognize the rising interest in our sector and our responsibility to ensure the facts about our games, operations and standards are understood,” he said.
Sweeps only: The SGLA said it will focus exclusively on social and sweepstakes platforms and will not lobby on behalf of sports-betting or cryptocurrency-based operators.
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Thailand: Parliamentary discussion over the IR casino bill is set to resume in July, according to a report in the Bangkok Post. The paper reported that MP Danuporn Punnakanta has said the bill is already on the parliamentary agenda and is expected to undergo a reading in front of the Thai National Assembly. A Senate special committee is currently reviewing the bill and recently suggested the public vote on entertainment complexes before parliament resumes its evaluation.
Underdog has relaunched its DFS contests in New York following a legal dispute with the state Gaming Commission, which had previously said the company was violating its fantasy sports regulations. This had resulted in the operator pulling its contests in March when it reached a $17.5m settlement with the Commission.
The British Horseracing Authority is the latest organization to come out against the UK government’s stated plan to harmonize online gambling taxes, arguing it would incentivize operators to reduce their focus on horseracing betting even further. Speaking to The Guardian, CEO Brant Dunshea said it would “make betting on racing more expensive for them to operate, and would also reduce customer incentives, promotions and so forth.”
FDJ United’s Betchoice brand in Australia – run by its wholly owned Kindred business – has been fined A$1m ($646k) by the Australian Communications and Media Authority, after an investigation found it failed to close the accounts in a timely manner for 954 of its customers who had registered with the National Self-Exclusion Register. In some cases, the accounts remained open for up to 190 days.
State by state
Ohio: Another iCasino bill has been filed in the state House, a week after a bill debuted in the state Senate. HB 298 proposes permitting online casino games, including live casino offerings. Rep. Brian Stewart, who previously said he was working on an iGaming bill for the House, is one of HB 298’s main sponsors. He estimates legalized iGaming would add $400m-$800m in annual tax revenue at maturity.
Maryland: The OSB tax rate increase has received approval from Gov. Wes Moore. Online revenue will now be taxed at 20% vs. the original rate of 15%. Retail sports-betting revenue will remain unchanged at 15%.
Minnesota: The state will go another year without sports betting after the legislature failed to pass a bill before the most recent session ended earlier this week. Multiple sports-betting bills did not advance during the session, including one that would have established regulations for online sports betting and fantasy sports through state tribes.
Colorado: The bill that will remove promotional bet deductions, and means an effective tax increase for OSB operators, received approval from Gov. Jared Polis. The bill will now be enacted on January 1, 2026. The deductions will be lowered in stages between January and July next year.
North Carolina: The state House opted not to include a sports-betting tax increase in its budget proposal, contradicting proposals from the state Senate, which has called for a doubling of the rate to 36%. The legislature will come together to negotiate the two budget proposals over the next few months with a deadline of July 1.
New York: The Steve Cohen and Hard Rock casino proposal for the Mets’ Citi Field site has received an endorsement for the bill to rezone the adjoining parkland from state Senate deputy majority leader Michael Gianaris. Meanwhile, both MGM Resorts’ Empire City Casino and Genting Malaysia’s Resorts World New York City should be awarded two of the three available downstate casino licenses right now, according to Yonkers Mayor Mike Spano.
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An in with Elon
Jobs for the bots: Kalshi is partnering with Elon Musk’s xAI to bring artificial intelligence to prediction markets. The tie-up will deliver AI-powered insights for users wagering on real-world events such as politics and central bank decisions, as the bots crunch news articles and historical data.
Both xAI and Kalshi are dedicating “significant engineering resources” to develop the partnership, a Bloomberg report noted.
The move has been viewed as a further emboldening of Kalshi, which is battling (and, at present, beating in court) regulators who accuse the firm of offering illegal gambling services.
Stars aligned: In adding Musk’s influence to its orbit, Kalshi has further deepened ties with Donald Trump’s administration.
Trump’s son Don Jr is a strategic adviser to Kalshi, alongside Brian Quintenz, a former CFTC commissioner nominated by President Trump to be the agency’s next chair.
Eliezer Mishory, Kalshi’s former general counsel, joined Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency earlier this year.
Call collect: Meanwhile, the acting chair of the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission, Caroline Pham, is reported to be planning a conference call with multiple tribal organizations. According to InGame, the call is expected to take place next week and follows the CFTC’s decision to cancel an industry roundtable revolving around prediction markets.
Dutch online woes
Looking peaky: The Dutch online gambling market is ailing and the prognosis is not good, but even as industry insiders issue dire warnings the country’s policy chiefs are intent on more strong medicine.
Online gambling revenue in the Netherlands underwent a sudden 12% YoY drop in the months after new affordability rules came into effect in October.
Within those figures, online casino revenues were the most drastically affected, falling 18.5% across the same period.
Dutch double down: Despite these eye-watering declines, the political climate for gambling remains toxic and the Dutch government has announced even harsher new rules.
In February, Minister for Legal Protection Teun Struycken revealed a new “vision” for gambling that will see additional ad restrictions, an increased age limit of 21 for the “riskiest games of chance” and an unspecified tightening of the controversial affordability regime.
The minister’s approach is seen as highly politicised by some observers and is on the softer end of the general parliamentary feeling towards gambling, which includes a group that want to see the licensing system that took effect in 2021 completely dismantled.
Don’t look back in anger: Peter-Paul de Goeij, who until recently sat at the centre of an industry nexus as head of the Netherlands Online Gambling Association, said the future for the Dutch online market was “bleak”.
De Goeij said “the Dutch legal market is in distress” and pointed to figures showing channeling to the legal market has dropped below 50%.
The former trade group boss is also sharply critical of Struycken’s plans for the industry, accusing him of going for a short-term political win.
“These initiatives will reduce the competitiveness of licensed operators and accelerate the shift towards the black market,” he said.
How bad could it get?: Persistent demands for the market to be wound back to a time when Holland Casino had a partial monopoly are unlikely to go away, but equally unlikely to be heeded by ministers, counselled de Goeij, but there is nevertheless more pain to come for operators who remain in the market.
Gambling taxes climbed to 34.2% of gross gambling revenue this year and will rise again to 37.8% in 2026.
Holland Casino itself has warned it faces a liquidity crisis in 2027 if the tax rises continue as planned. Even before the hike kicked in, the operator saw its online turnover drop 26.5% in 2024, which it directly attributes to the introduction of affordability-linked deposit limits.
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UK financial checks update
This is not who we are: In providing a further update on its ongoing financial risk assessments pilot, the UK Gambling Commission has reasserted the checks are not affordability tests and insisted it “does not have any regulatory requirements for affordability checks and is not proposing any.”
Doth protest: To hammer home the point, the Commission said yesterday the risk assessments currently being trialled are “much more targeted.”
It added that they would not affect a customer’s credit score if they were introduced in the future.
Indicative: The update from Helen Rhodes, director of major policy projects and evaluation, published yesterday said that in stage 2 there were ~1.7 million risk assessments made across three credit reference agencies in relation to ~860k accounts.
This is an increased number of risk assessments compared to stage 1 due to the design of stage 2.
“This is not indicative of how many accounts might be assessed if the assessments were introduced in a live environment,” Rhodes said.
Rubbing along: She said that in stage 2 the percentage of checks that were “in a frictionless manner” rose to 97% vs. 95% in stage 1. This compares with the original estimate from the 2023 UK White Paper of 80%.
Thinning out: Rhodes said that included in this total was the “thin file” rate, where the customer could be identified but there was limited information and no adverse information.
“We consider these ‘thin files’ to show no financial risk in the gambling context,” Rhodes added.
This rate stayed at approximately 3% of the assessments in both stages.
Around 3% of the assessments were “not matched” in stage 2 vs. 5% in stage 1. Rhodes said this may be down to having access to more up-to-date operator data. A frictionless assessment was not possible in these cases, she added.
“This is favourable compared to the estimated 20% who would not have a frictionless assessment as set out in the 2023 Government White Paper,” said Rhodes.
She added that if the proposed thresholds from the Commission’s 2023 consultation were introduced, stage 2 findings lead to an estimated 0.1% of accounts that would both require an assessment and be unable to receive an assessment in a frictionless manner.
“This would mean that an operator would only be unable to meet the requirements in a frictionless way for one customer in every 1,000 accounts,” she said.
“We are beginning to understand more about the financial risk profile of the customers who met the thresholds for the pilot,” she added.
Power of three: The Commission said stage 3 of the pilot has been completed and is now at reporting stage. Rhodes said the Commission would be using stage 3 and post-pilot analysis to further explore how the assessments could be targeted where there is most financial risk.
“We will also explore how any unnecessary inconsistency between credit reference agencies could be reduced and how operators could be supported in any future implementation,” she said.
“These further findings from the pilot have helped us understand the extent that assessments could be conducted in a frictionless manner.
Events
Event highlight: Gaming in Holland has announced its full line-up for this year’s event, including keynotes from Björn Fuchs, newly appointed chair of VNLOK; and Henry Meijdam, who heads the VAN Kansspelen trade association. Also confirmed are speeches from Arjan Blok, CEO of Nederlandse Loterij; Renske Fikkers, head of market supervision at the Netherlands Gambling Authority; and Henk Willem Smits, investigative reporter at Follow the Money. To register, click here.
Jun 5: Gaming in Holland, Amsterdam
Jun 9-12: IAGA, Berlin
Jun 26: Gaming in Spain, Madrid
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