Thais that bind

Thai government publishes draft rules to legalize casinos

Aug 06, 2024

Thailand: Initial plan is for 30-year licenses for large-scale IRs.
In +More: Pennsylvania skill games legal attempt.
Guilty plea for bookie at heart of Ohtani scandal.
Massachusetts plans an online lottery launch.
Australia set to favor gambling ad cap over total ban.

In a show with everything but Yul Brenner.

Thailand’s 30-year plan

Rules of engagement: Thailand’s Council of State has published a draft of the rules that will govern the licensing of casinos in the country for the first time.

According to a report from Bloomberg, operators will be invited to apply for 30-year licenses with the option to renew for a further 10 years.

Panel beaters: The draft document also sets out plans for a regulatory body as well as a separate panel that will consider where the IRs will be located. That panel will be led by the prime minister. The draft document envisages the IRs will consist of large entertainment complexes along with hotels, convention centers and amusement parks.

Greater Bangkok, Phuket, Chiang Mai and Chonburi have been highlighted as potential locations for developments.
Among the operators known to be exploring potential opportunities in Thailand are Las Vegas Sands, Galaxy Entertainment and MGM Resorts.
The latter said on its Q2 earnings call last week that it would look to exploit the opportunity in Thailand via its MGM China vehicle.

Cos tourists are money: Bloomberg pointed out that Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin has been aggressively pushing policies to attract foreign investments to Thailand, and backed the plan to legalize casinos for better oversight and proper tax collection.

A study earlier this year and commissioned by the country's House of Representatives suggested casino resorts could raise ~$12bn in incremental tourist spend.

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+More

WAGER move: A bi-partisan bill to repeal the federal sports-betting excise tax has been introduced in the US Senate by Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto from Nevada and Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith from Mississippi. The bill dubbed Withdrawing Arduous Gaming Excise Rates Act, or the WAGER Act, would eliminate the 0.25 percent handle tax on all sports bets.

A similar bill was introduced into the US House in March by Rep. Dina Titus from Nevada and Rep. Guy Reschenthaler from Pennsylvania.
The AGA issued a statement supporting the move, noting that the 70-year-old legislation put licensed OSB operators at a competitive disadvantage.

Skill complaint: Casino owners in Pennsylvania – including Penn Entertainment and Caesars – have asked the state’s highest court to declare a tax on slot machine revenue is unconstitutional because the state doesn’t impose it broadly on cash-paying electronic game terminals, known as skill games, that can be found in many bars and stores.

Star Entertainment: The special manager appointed by the New South Wales Independent Casino Commission to oversee the remediation efforts at the company’s troubled Sydney property, Nicholas Weeks, will continue working until at least next March. It is the third such extension.

The Commission has confirmed it has received the final report from the Bell II inquiry into Star’s suitability to hold the gaming license but has not released details of the report.
Meanwhile, the company’s chief risk officer, Scott Saunders, has announced he is to resign as of January 31, 2025.

SkyCity Entertainment: The company’s Auckland casino will be shuttered for five days – from September 9-13 – as part of its license suspension settlement with New Zealand’s Department of Internal Affairs.

Curaçao: The managing director of the country’s Gaming Control Board, Cedric Pietersz, said the country’s regulator has been inundated with applications, causing delays to the licensing process.

Current iGaming licenses will expire on August 31, and existing operators must receive a license under the new framework.

A recent bonus offer from Evoke’s William Hill wasn’t clear and didn’t properly disclose that some payment methods, such as Apple Pay, were not accepted, according to the ASA. Meanwhile, a complaint about a mobile advertising hoarding for Entain’s Coral brand at the Cheltenham Festival being placed close to two schools was not upheld.

Brazil: Technical standards for the incoming online gaming regime have been published less than three weeks ahead of the deadline for initial applications. They include details of the 15% tax on player winnings. Notably, popular crash games will be allowed.

A random risk analysis by regulators in the Netherlands tripped up four operators found to have weak controls to guard against match-fixing risks. Kansspelautoriteit warned the unnamed quartet to improve their integrity checks, noting that they could be fined if found to have not made the necessary improvements.

Compliance Assistant – London / St Albans
Compliance Director – São Paulo
Head of Compliance – Malta

Ohtani case

Bow down: The bookie who placed millions of dollars in bets with cash stolen from baseball superstar Shohei Ohtani by the player’s former interpreter has agreed to plead guilty to three federal charges.

Mathew Bowyer admitted to running a longstanding bookmaking operation in the plea agreement, after it emerged he was in cahoots with Ippei Mizuhara, once the best friend of All-Star Ohtani.
Prosecutors believe Mizuhara stole $17m from Ohtani, in an effort to pay off some $180m in gambling debts he had racked up.
The complaint revealed that Bowyer was in constant text contact with Mizuhara, and once told the interpreter he had spotted Ohtani walking his dog and would approach the Dodgers star if Mizuhara didn’t answer his texts.
Bowyer, based in Orange County, California, is set to plead guilty to charges of operating an unlawful gambling business, money laundering and subscribing to a false tax return.
The plea agreement was announced by the US attorney’s office for the Central District of California.

If you don’t know me by now: In May, ESPN reported Bowyer was known as a whale to casinos in Vegas and Nevada, but operators have repeatedly denied any knowledge that he was laundering profits from his illegal operation through venues by depositing sums and then cashing out chips.

Mizuhara allegedly paid Bowyer through an associate, who wired the money to a marker account at Resorts World in Vegas.
Bowyer and partner then withdrew the money in chips, gambled at Resorts World, lost around $7.9m and were eventually banned from all US casinos following the federal raid at the end of last year.

All eyez on me: A week prior to the start of this year’s Major League Baseball campaign, the scandal surrounding Ohtani blew up after it was reported his account had illegally wired money to Bowyer, who was on the feds’ radar.

A subsequent investigation by the league closed on the day Mizuhara pleaded guilty to federal charges of fraud, with all parties clearing Ohtani of any involvement and noting he had been an innocent victim.
It emerged Bowyer “allowed people to believe” that Ohtani was his actual client, but the bookie’s lawyer later clarified the men had never met or had any interaction.

Mass iLottery plan

Ticket to ride: The recently legalized Massachusetts iLottery is expected to go live in late 2025. The 16-month timeframe will provide the state with enough runway to launch a comprehensive suite of offerings, including draw game tickets and multiple e-instant variants.

“Besides the option to buy drawing game tickets, such as Powerball and Mass Cash, the majority will comprise e-instant tickets, which is “an online version of a scratch ticket,” Massachusetts State Lottery director Mark William Bracken told MassLive.
“One would be your traditional scratch ticket, and the online version will have a simulated scratch,” Bracken said.
There will also be options similar to mobile app games, giving the customer a semblance of control, including price-point, which will be left up to the consumer in some instances.

Pointing the finger: Interestingly, legal sports betting may have nudged online lottery over the finish line. Earlier this year, Bracken told lawmakers sports betting was negatively impacting lottery sales and the introduction of a very popular $50 scratch-off ticket “papered over” the negative sales trend.

“We couldn’t control that all of a sudden we had sports betting as a competitor that was doing $6bn, $5bn in sales,” Bracken told MassLive in March.
“We’re not anti-sports betting,” he said.
“But the issue that we’ve talked about many times is that sports bettors can offer that convenience of being able to play on your phone.”

Did I do that? A looming question is how lawmakers will react to the news that the Massachusetts Lottery website will essentially offer online casino games under the name of e-instants.

Lawmakers authorized an online lottery through the budget, which means there was little debate and sans the standard fact-finding mission carried out during the committee process. The result was language ambiguously reading, “lottery tickets, games and shares.”

According to several people who watched the budget process play out, lawmakers were under the impression that online lottery offerings would be limited to draw games, at least to start.

With 16 or so months before launch, one must wonder if any lawmakers will want to revisit the topic of online lottery and perhaps clarify what is and isn’t allowed.
The Minnesota legislature did this in 2015 after the lottery started offering online ticket sales. Even though the Minnesota Lottery has free reign to authorize new products, the legislature felt online sales crossed a line and they needed to step in.

Oz gambling ad cap

What’s the frequency, Kenneth: Australia’s federal government is gearing to introduce “frequency caps” that limit the number of ads an operator can show, rather than a full blackout on sports-betting advertising.

Communications Minister Michelle Rowland is said to have brokered a “middle ground” solution that allows licensed operators to beam television ads with stricter rules than are currently in place.
Ads may be limited to two per hour on each channel until 10pm, with an embargo on all such ads one hour before and after televised live sporting events.
The Sydney Morning Herald, which broke the report, suggested social media gambling advertising may be banned completely.
The frequency caps model is believed to be the work of Sportsbet, Tabcorp and lobby group Responsible Wagering Australia, all of whom met with Rowland last week.

The whole enchilada: Last year, a parliamentary inquiry into online gambling recommended a total ban on all forms of advertising for online gambling, to be phased in over three years. The panel also recommended the formation of a national gambling regulator to supervise all licensing and regulation nationwide and an annual levy for online operators to fund player harm measures.

Major sporting bodies have rowed in behind the limit, arguing a total ban would gut the significant revenue the industry generates for teams and players.
The TV networks have also fought to protect the $155m gambling advertising revenue they collect in each calendar year, as recorded by the Australian media watchdog.
They are demanding the $46m they pay in spectrum fees each year should be reduced as a way of making up the advertising drop.
Sports broadcasting rights fetch huge sums, with lucrative gambling dollars used to offset those costs.

Calendar

Aug 12-14: Oklahoma Indian Gaming Conference
Sep 24: Player Protection, SBC Summit, Lisbon

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