French bookies fined for excessive payout
ANJ fines books for World Cup payout excesses, FR casinos denounce FDJ ads, UK black market growth and loads more
Good morning, on Gaming & Co today:
French bookmakers fined by regulator for exceeding payout ratios
French casinos denounce FDJ’s ad messaging for payments business
Worrying UK black market growth
FDJ-owned Kindred Group withdraws from Poland
UK government announces £100m levy to combat gambling harm
News shorts: Bet-at-home sale, Polymarket bans French players, KSA fine for Blue High House
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ANJ fines eight of France’s leading bookmakers
Leading brands such as Winamax and Unibet overstepped the payout ratio limits during Qatar World Cup as wagering hit record levels.
Over the limit: France’s Autorité Nationale des Jeux (ANJ) has imposed fines of between €5,000 and €150,000 on eight online sportsbooks for exceeding the maximum payout ratio of 85%. ANJ did not disclose which operators received specific fines, but according to the newspaper Les Echos, market leaders Betclic and Winamax have been fined €150,000, while Kindred Group’s flagship brand Unibet was hit with a €100,000 penalty. Further down the scale were PMU (€15,000) and NetBet (€10,000).
Crazy final: The penalties refer to the operators’ activities in 2022, which culminated in France’s run to the final of the FIFA World Cup in Qatar. French operators enjoyed record activity during the event and told ANJ that wagering levels were such that they were not always able to stick to the payout limits.
ANJ said the size of each fine reflects “the extent to which the ratio was exceeded, the importance of the operator in the sector and/or the fact that the operator had already been the subject of a sanction”. It follows seven decisions issued against operators in April 2023 for similar offences.
A certain ratio: Bookmakers recorded more than €600m in stakes during the World Cup and exceeded the pay out ratios by margins ranging from 0.1% (85.1%) to +1.1% (86.10%) to +5.3% (90.3%).
France set the maximum payout ratio at 85% when the sector regulated in 2010. Lawmakers claim it acts as a tool that deters excessive gambling, money laundering and the financing of terrorist activities.
French exception: However, other European jurisdictions allow payout ratios of up to 97%. While French operators are able to book margins into their forecasts, they have long complained about having to market tighter odds and illegal operators' ability to attract punters with higher bonuses and payout ratios.
Further reading: Last week G&C reported on the payout ratios of FDJ’s instant games and why they matter as part of the online casino regulation debate.
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French casinos denounce FDJ’s payments business
Casinos de France says FDJ is a "bulldozer" that benefits from unfair advantage as it expands beyond gaming.
On alert: France’s land-based casino syndicate Casinos de France (CdF) has complained to ANJ that Française des Jeux (FDJ) is abusing its monopoly status to sell its payment service Nirio.
Red or black: Nirio provides bank accounts and enables users to pay bills, rent and other outgoings through FDJ’s 30,000 retail outlets. In a letter addressed to ANJ, CdF said the slogan used in the advert – “To save money, put yourself in the red” – played on an ambiguous double-meaning and could incite players into irresponsible behaviour.
FDJ told Les Echos that the claim was "unjustified", but CdF claimed the lottery giant was “blurring the lines between financial management and access to real money gaming products”. It also called on ANJ to “supervise more strictly initiatives like Nirio” and remind FDJ of its obligations when it comes to marketing messaging and communications.
Earlier this year, CdF said FDJ was benefiting from an unfair playing field and that the revenues it accrues through its lottery monopoly had given it the means to acquire Unibet parent Kindred Group for €2.6bn.
Fabrice Paire, board member of Groupe Partouche and VP of CdF, told French media a month ago that FDJ “is a bulldozer that is moving forward step by step and flattening everything, but unlike normal bulldozers it is silent and makes no noise”.
UK black market bigger than Sweden’s and Netherlands’
Top end growth: The UK black market could grow as much as 32% during 2024 with NGR potentially soaring to around £1.5bn, according to the latest figures from Eilers & Krejcik Gaming (EKG). The top end estimate would see the UK black market account for 14% of the UK’s total net gaming revenue, ahead of the Netherlands (12%) and Sweden (10%).
The report’s author, Alun Bowden, EKG SVP of Strategic Insight, commented: “The last 12 months or so has seen a very big change in market dynamics in the UK and the black market is growing at a very fast clip based on all indicators I can see…. [It] is now far too big to ignore in the UK and will only keep growing unless something is done to curtail it.”
The report highlighted high-value players avoiding affordability checks as a key factor in the continuing rise.
While EKG said a best case scenario would be an illegal sector of just £600m, the higher estimate is not out of line with previous figures from the likes of YieldSec and the Betting & Gaming Council (BGC). Yield Sec previously documented a 4x growth in the illegal sector in 2022 and a doubling in 2023. The data provider claimed the illegal market accounted for 4% of UK GGR of £6.5bn in 2022-23.
The EKG team outlined three main channels for illegal operators: ‘traditional’ offshore online operators; private bookmakers operating on Whatsapp or Telegram, (which shrugged off the August arrest of CEO Pavel Durov in August by French authorities to report a 225% growth in H1 revenue to $525m), and crypto operators.
The report concluded: “While the black market is not a structural risk in its present form, the rate at which it is growing and the increasing attention it is attracting is a big risk for the UK in the medium- to long-term.”
FDJ-owned Kindred Group withdraws from Poland
Kindred Group has withdrawn all its products from Poland as it continues its post-acquisition drive to close down its presence in dot.com markets.
La Française des Jeux, which completed its €2.5bn acquisition of Kindred Group last month, made it a priority to close down Kindred’s dot com markets, which accounted for 17% of gross winnings revenue at the time of the transaction.
“The combined group will operate only on markets that are locally regulated or on the path of becoming regulated, meaning that the group is going to exit all of the markets on which it operates on a non-locally regulated basis,” announced FDJ at the time of closure.
This included markets such as Norway, which has been a constant source of dispute between Kindred and the Norwegian authorities, and Poland, where local industry association Graj Legalnie has demanded its removal.
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UK government announces £100m levy to combat gambling harm
Levy up: The UK government has introduced a compulsory levy to help fund research, prevention and treatment of gambling-related harm. Every licensed operator will be charged between 0.1% and 1.1% of gross revenues depending on the sector they operate in.
The exact rate will be decided according to operating costs and the levels of harmful gambling associated with each sector. A spokesperson for the Department of Media Culture and Sport could not provide more detail at the time of going to press.
The levy will be distributed as follows: 50% will be directed to NHS England and appropriate bodies in Scotland and Wales, 30% will go towards prevention and 20% of funding will be directed to UK Research & Innovation to inform future policy and regulation.
News shorts
Crypto prediction market operator Polymarket has restricted access to French users following an investigation into its activities by the Autorité Nationale des Jeux. The move was widely expected following Polymarket’s rise in profile during and following the US presidential elections, when it transpired that one of the site’s biggest customers was a French national called ‘Théo’.
In the money: ‘Théo’ is understood to have won close to $80m by backing Donald Trump. Polymarket does not take bets from the US, but along with US-based Kalshi, it dominated betting-related news on the elections on X/Twitter.
Betclic Group’s German-facing sportsbook Bet-at-home is looking for an acquirer, according to Next.io. The company has experienced legal and financial troubles in recent years, but having switched platforms in 2021 it posted a 9% YoY increase in GGR to €38m.
Dutch gambling regulator Kansspelautoriteit (KSA) has fined Panama-based operator Blue High House €1.1 m for operating in the Netherlands without a licence. It is the operator's second fine this year.
Affiliates quality mark QMRA has launched Game Lounge in Greece for its HellasCasinos.com site as the first affiliate to win the Quality Mark Responsible Affiliates (QMRA) in the market. The quality mark has previously been launched in Belgium, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, the UK, Italy and more.
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