Archives: June 2018

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Betfred is one of the most popular bookmakers in the country. As part of its responsibility to various stakeholders, the company issues annual statements of the financial position and the income levels. In its latest financial report, the firm announced huge losses; this was not expected as its revenues had grown within the financial year.

According to the recent report, the revenue levels increased to £634.5 million, a 9.6% rise from the 2015/2016 financial year. The losses were estimated at 10s of millions. Betfred is a privately owned company. The earnings were estimated at £83.3 million, a 3% increase from the previous year. To diversify its financial gains, the firm has several investment platforms. The total earnings from the betting platforms also rose by 17.5% to reach £12.7 billion. The increased revenues were attributed to the firm’s decision to add the number of betting shops available to their

The decision was arrived at after agreeing with the Hong Kong Jockey Club; this led to a significant increase in the number of online customers. The online betting platform’s revenue improved by 3%, this is according to the Regulus analysts. The losses were estimated at £13.4 million. In the 2015/2016 financial year, Betfred had profit margins of £32.4 million. According to the bookmaker, the operating losses were as a result of the decline in the goodwill from the digital assets, more responsibilities, and the operating costs. The high tax rates for betting firms have led to adverse effects to many firms in the industry. Some opponents have argued that the move by the firm’s founder, Fred done, to take £10.2 million in the form of dividends had a negative impact on the final financial results. The pioneer of the organization is also said to have taken the same amount during the 2015/2016 fiscal year.

Some sources have disclosed the bookmaker’s plans to close about 900 betting shops situated at different locations in the country. The move would also lead to loss of jobs to about 4500 of the employees. The firm would take action if the government passed legislation that would lower the maximum stake on fixed odds from £100 to £2. The government pointed out that the law would take effect from 2020 to give more room for more consultations among the stakeholders in the industry. The firm has invested a lot of resources to its retail line of business. Regulus attributed more than 80% of the bookmaker’s income to the segment. The analysts suggested radical structural changes for the firm to survive in the changing business environment. Failure to which it would experience more financial losses. Betfred has not had a good relationship with different players in the racing industry. The firm has held talks with Alizeti Capital to sell one of its subsidiary, Tote Holdings.

The government proposed the changes in the gaming industry due to the rising concerns over the gambling industry. According to the UK government, the industry required some regulation as there was evidence to show increased addiction to betting. The most affected individuals were the youths. With the changes in Law, it was expected that people would engage in activities that were more productive. According to Betfred’s managing director, the new law would have a negative impact on the gaming industry. Other than fewer profits for the bookmakers, he pointed out that thousands of individuals would lose their jobs and low tax collections and eventually slow down the economic growth. He urged the government to use alternative measures to curb the gambling activities in the country.

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An online gambling firm known as “32Red” was recently issued with a fine of over £2m for failure to protect a compulsive gambler and encouraging the customer to gamble further instead.

The Gambling Commission argues that the company needed to have raised an alarm and done something after identifying several addiction signs exhibited by the customer rather than offer him a VIP status.

Despite the customer depositing amounts as large as £758,000 between 2014 and 2017, 32Red did not conduct money laundering checks or acted to ensure the welfare of the customer as required by the law. Instead of offering assistance and advice, the company gave out free bonuses to encourage the vulnerable customer to play further, said the regulator. In addition, the entity failed to check if the customer was able to afford the amounts they were spending on gambling.

The customer had spent an average of £45,000 per month on gambling in spite of having a net salary of £2,150. Even though they had given the company a proof claiming that they earn a net salary of £13,000 per month, the Gambling Commission argued that it was not credible. The account was only scrutinized a little bit when the customer won a seven-figure prize and then instantly spent all of it on gambling–a warning sign of addiction.

The executive director of the Gambling Commission, Richard Watson, argued that the company should have checked on the client’s welfare after they had exhibited a gambling addiction rather than encouraging them to gamble further. But 32Red did the exact opposite of that.

He went on to say that gambling providers must be ready to take action whenever they spot signs of gambling addiction and should be carefully reviewing all the clients that seem to visit their facilities a lot more times than normal.

Watson concluded his speech by saying that protecting customers from gambling-related problems remains a top priority for the regulator and where it sees gambling companies failing in their duty to keep their clients safe, the regulator will take stern action against those companies.

Kindred, which is the parent company of 32Red agreed to pay the fine and said it had put in place a behavior-monitoring system for the good of its clients. The spokesperson of the Swedish owned multinational that is based in Malta said the organization is making efforts across the board to put together and better business processes, using best practices from all areas of the business.

The company representative further said that as a company putting sustainability at the very core of its business strategy, Kindred remains committed to ensuring customers can enjoy gambling in an environment that is safe as well as secure.

Among the changes and improvements that the company vowed to make include:

  • Introducing a better anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing policy to enable better and faster detection of the use of the company’s gambling services by criminals for money laundering or terrorist purposes.
  • Bringing in an external auditor to do a complete audit of the company’s anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing policies, procedures as well as controls while the company is ready to accept and implement the auditor’s recommendations.
  • Conducting a complete review of all existing and new customers against revised policies.
  • Integrating all entities under Kindred to one platform, so they work with a unified and aligned policy.

The company plans to raise the over £2m penalty issued by the court by divesting £709,046 off its financial gains and adding that to the £1.3 million fund it set aside as payment in lieu of a financial penalty.

 

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The award-winning online instant win games supplier, IWG, has delivered their full portfolio to the largest bingo sportsbook in the United Kingdom, Sky Bingo, as part of their expansion of its commercial operators.

For the first time, the games will be accessible on the Sky Bingo site as part of the agreement. IWG games, Cash Buster, are now live on the bingo site as a result of integration with IWG’s progressive play RGS. According to Robert Proctor, who is the content and commercial manager at Sky Betting and Gaming, it was a natural choice to partner with the leading supplier in the instant win game space. He added that the firm had been impressed with the standard of games which comes with an easy integration through progressive play. He also promised that their clients would enjoy IWG classics, including Cash Buster series on a daily basis.

 

The CEO at IWG, Rhydian Fisher said that they were thrilled to provide the UK’s largest bingo sportsbook with the quality portfolio of games. He added that the latest agreement was an indication of the growing demand for instant win games as well as their dedicated services. The agreement, however, does not cause any changes in the quality of services provided by the firm; it instead is a boost to the variety of services offered by IWG ensuring that the lovers of online instant win games through the UK enjoy their services following a seamless integration with the progressive play RGS network.

 

For the past 15 years, IWG has been providing its clients, lotteries, with instant win services which are online; this has led to the production of over two hundred and fifty high-quality instant win games. In 2017, the firm won a B2B award as the supplier of the year for an online lottery.