Each week, SBC CIS editors look back at the events of the previous week to highlight the most interesting and resonant ones for you.
Facebook updates its sports betting advertising policy, Belarus wants to increase tax collections from the online gambling sector, Belgian National Lottery bans sports betting advertising amidst 2022 FIFA World Cup, Rush Street Interactive’s Tammi Barlow talks about differences in EU and US responsible gaming measures, Smartsoft extends their partnership with Entain, executives at BetGames and Sportradar sat down for an interview with SBC editors, Wazdan strenghtens their positions in the Balkans, and Superbet Group extends their partnership with Genius Sports to develop free-to-play games.
More on these, as usual, in our digest below.
Facebook recently updated its sports betting advertising policy, noting that potential advertisers must request written permission to advertise on the platform.
These requests must be submitted to Meta Platforms, Facebook’s parent company. As defined by Meta, these queries refer to «common types of gambling such as betting», lotteries, sweepstakes, casino games, fantasy sports, bingo, poker, sweepstakes, etc.
Belarus plans to increase the amount of taxes its government collects from the online gambling sector.
According to the Belarusian edition of Economic Newspaper, the tax rate on income from “virtual gambling establishments” (a formal name for online gambling in the Belarusian legislative dictionary) will be raised from 4% to 8%. This change will come into force starting from January 1, 2023. Online gambling operators will also face new working conditions.
Belgian National Lottery will not advertise sports betting products during the 2022 FIFA World Cup. Local media reports that Finance Minister Vincent van Peteghem is tightening his approach to sports betting advertising.
«Advertising for sports betting should have no place in broadcasts or reports via television, radio and written press. The National Lottery is already setting a good example by not advertising its sports betting in these channels», — explained the Minister.
The ban plan will continue into the new year. All forms of sports betting marketing will be banned by 2024.
Tammi Barlow, a CRS specialist, talks about the pros and cons of responsible gambling in the US in a recent Martin Lycka’s Safe Bet Show podcast.
Having experience in such companies as William Hill, Caesars, IGT, and now Rush Street Interactive, Tammi Barlow compares the state of responsible gaming initiatives both in Europe and in the US. According to her, the US gambling industry is moving in a ‘really great’ way in terms of implementing responsible gambling measures.
Smartsoft Gaming, a leading provider of non-traditional casino games, based in Georgia, has announced a stellar partnership with Entain – one of the world’s largest sports betting and gaming groups.
As part of this deal, Smartsoft will supply Entain with its portfolio of games including the flagship game JetX.
Smartsoft has a long-term exclusive partnership with one of Entain’s local brands Crystalbet to provide a variety of products: from non-traditional casino games to slots, live casino, and board games.
Henceforth and building on this successful partnership, Smartsoft’s games will be live on Entain’s global, landmark iGaming brands: Bwin, Sportingbet, PartyCasino, and more.
BetGames CEO Andreas Koeberl and Sportradar Managing Director of Integrity Andreas Krannich sat down with SBC editors for a joint interview to discuss how their new partnership will strengthen Twain Sport’s new generation of sports betting verticals.
Wazdan, an iGaming company, expressed their excitement about the future development of the commercial partnership with SYNOT Interactive in order to gain a more firm foothold in Europe.
This will allow her to be more productive in Serbia and Montenegro, where SYNOT is using its aggregation platform to distribute the Wazdan portfolio of over 150 items through its network of operators.
Through this Wazdan extension, operators will have access to games such as 9 Coins, Magic Spins, Sun of Fortune, Fortune Reels, Power of Gods and games featured in the Hot Slot series. Wazdan games are already available on Maxbet in both Serbia and Montenegro.
Superbet Group, a European betting and gambling operator, has expanded its partnership with Genius Sports to develop free-to-play games.
The updated partnership adds new goals for attracting and retaining players. It builds on agreements from 2019 that dealt with official data, deals, and streaming.
Partners are planning, building and launching a special series of FTP predictors for Superbet customers, supported by the Genius software service, to attract players to games and other promotions and create value for operators.
Stay tuned for more news this week and don’t forget to subscribe to our Telegram channel!
