France's mayors vent anger at online bill
France iCasino, Ok for FDJ-ZEBet M&A, SBC Summit, Spain Q2 &Co
Good morning on Gaming & Co today:
France’s mayors and casino communes angry at draft online bill.
FDJ approved for ZEBet takeover but “subject to conditions”.
SBC Summit Barcelona round up.
Spain Q2, news briefs & Co.
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French casino towns call for government rewrite of draft bill
France’s JONUM-iCasino amendments continued to cause anger, this time from the casino towns and communities.
Casino anger: Following the amendments tabled at the end of last week on possible online casino regulation linked to JONUM, France's local representatives took over from the land-based casinos to express their concerns and ask President Emmanuel Macron to rewrite the text of the bill.
400 blows: In a letter sent to the government and quoted by Les Echos, the leaders of the tourist industry, coastal communities and spa towns, where casinos are based, along with the Association of French Mayors, pointed out that casinos generate "almost €400m in revenue for their local authorities" and €1.5bn in tax revenues for the state every year.
Philippe Sueur, chairman of one of the trade bodies, said "players' wallets are not expandable, and with online casinos that are not twinned with brick-and-mortar casinos (as proposed in the amendments), land-based casinos will lose 30% of their revenues".
Sueur added: "Casinos are the main resource for our tourism investments. Without them, there would be no convention centre in Deauville or reconstruction of the thermal baths in (spa town of) Enghien."
Not inclusive: The proposed regulation of JONUMs, the web3 products offered by groups like Sorare and Socios, is of concern to the French casino industry because it has not been included in any new regulatory framework and were not invited to take part in any of the roundtable discussions.
French online bookmakers and Française des jeux (FDJ) also take a dim view of the red carpet being rolled out for a web3 groups such as Sorare, whose NFT cards and sports fantasy leagues attract many young players.
Taxation, another key issue: As part of the JONUM draft text, web3 companies would be taxed at 20% VAT, whereas the gambling sector is heavily taxed.
Crypto payouts: Winnings could also be paid in crypto-currencies, a demand, according to Les Echos, made by the web3 companies. One contact told the newspaper: "It would be incomprehensible, I don't see how we could consider that these aren't gambling games."
As a reminder, at the beginning of the week the Casinos de France and the Association des Casinos Indépendants de France trade associations stated that "all" the stakeholders in the sector had taken part in the discussions organised by the special commission on the new bill, except for land-based casinos".
CdF and ACIF added that "it would have been fair to hear from the casinos, which have repeatedly called on the special commission (to be heard) in the same way as the other gaming sectors. This omission is inexplicable, given that the industry generates nearly €1.4bn in tax revenues each year, including almost €500m for the regions."
FDJ approved for ZEBet M&A
France’s Competition Authority has given its approval to the takeover of online sports betting site ZETurf/ZEBet by Française des jeux, but "subject to conditions". FDJ will have to comply with "behavioural commitments" and has undertaken not to use its monopoly gaming activities, such as the online lottery and physical sports betting outlets, to develop its digital sports and horse betting offer via its new acquisition.
The incumbent operator will separate the two activities with separate online sites or applications for each type of activity and "no common homepage or gateway" from one product to the other.
In addition, the group will not create a single player account from which players can bet on the two segments and will not promote the products online in its outlets and will operate separate social network accounts for each activity.
SBC Summit, Barcelona
The 'SBC Leaders' panel that launched the event saw executives from conglomerates such as Flutter and Betsson extol the virtues of their international expansions.
Go 'glocal': All the panelists praised the 'glocal' model, combining global vision and local focus targeted to individual markets. For Nils Anden, CEO of Kindred Group, "the playbook is pretty much the same whatever the market: product, CX (customer experience) and payments".
For Jesper Svensson, CEO of Betsson, it is "important to have a lot of legs to stand on" and to operate in a wide range of markets, which makes it possible to "diversify risks".
But while new markets such as Brazil and across Africa are a big focus for the sector at the moment, moderator Quirino Mancini reminded the audience that mature markets such as "Italy and France are undergoing major reforms, and a market like Germany is also making progress. We need to keep an eye on these key markets".
Converge this: For the panellists discussing the convergence of media and sports betting, the convergence of the two mediums is logical. However, the economic weight of the sector also counts for a lot. Matt Heiman, CEO of The Game Day, said the rise in convergence was also due to economic factors.
Show. Me. The. Money : “There is lots of money chasing advertising slots and online (inventory) is always available to the highest bidders,” noted Heiman. “But it’s not like (advertising slots for) drinks or other consumer goods and betting businesses will always bid the most, it’s often a case of ‘follow the money’.”
The speakers were divided on artificial intelligence. For Dean Akinfoji, CEO of sponsorship agency Football Media, "convergence is linked to the search for efficiency, the betting market is very competitive".
Marco Castaldo, CEO of Microgame, said his group "is not ready to use AI for the sports content" it produces for its customers. "Because that would be offering a 'me too' proposition. There's not as much value as there is with content generated by humans."
Beyond Phase 1: Discussing the upcoming 'Phase 2' of the North American market, Kresimir Spajic, CEO of Betfred US, said that affiliate marketing is still very underdeveloped. "One or two affiliates generate almost 80% of the players and have a lot of negotiating power with the operators".
Mark Harper, general manager of Covers.com, advised new entrants not to launch in ultra-competitive states such as New Jersey or New York. "Start with a tier 2 state and learn how to build up your content and understand what works in the market."
With regard to operators' online-offline offerings, speakers on the 'omnichannel' panel said that operators needed to have integrated and seamless offerings. Marco Bedendo, COO of Microgame, said that any operator that "does not have an omnichannel strategy will not be winning in this market".
Spain Q2
The amount wagered by Spanish players climbed almost 20% YoY to €926m and GGR was up 55% to €313m.
Online sports betting GGR shot up 118% to €133m and online casino GGR grew 28% to €150m.
Operators' marketing spend was up 3% YoY to almost €97m, but following advertising restrictions introduced in 2021 operators seem to have redirected some of their budgets towards affiliates. Advertising budgets were up by almost 8% to €34m, but affiliation was up by 56% to €12m and what the DGOJ termed ‘sponsorship’ was up 225% to €1.2m.
News in brief
The Swedish government has proposed increasing the level of tax on operators' GGR from 18% to 22%. If approved, the measure would come into effect from July 2024 and generate around €45m in additional annual revenues for the state.
Microgaming's new CEO Stephen Fisk has said that under his leadership the group will return to its B2B roots and focus on its online gaming platform services.
In particular, the group will dedicate itself to the online casino brands of Super Group, its entity listed on the New York Stock Exchange.
The latter divides its iCasino activities thorough Spin Palace and Betway for online sports betting.
Betway shut down ceased its French operations in March.
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