Betting Crackdown in Albania
Albania’s Prime Minister, Edi Rama, passes measure to relocate sports-betting locations away from residential areas in the country
Te Albanian government has adopted legislation changes due to be enacted in 2019 that will penalise sports-betting locations across the country
ALBANIA LEGISLATION
In a measure meant to tackle the spread of gambling in Albania, Prime Minister Edi Rama has announced that, by 31 December, all sports- betting facilities operating in the country will have to relocate from residential areas. Te announcement follows a two-year extension to a law creating an exclusion zone in downtown areas by relocating electronic casinos to the outskirts and setting a 100 meter aerial distance for sports betting shops from religious or educational institutions and from each other.
“Starting December 31, all electronic casinos will cease their operations under the gambling law. Te change also involve sports-betting as well as any bet for every kind of race involving horses, dogs or any kind of slave of the Albanian fauna,” stated Prime Minister Rama. “Starting January 1, no shutters will open for betting and as already envisaged by the current law and no shutters will open for electronic casinos in any residential area in the 28,000 km2 of the Republic of Albania,” added Rama.
In addition to the notice to gaming operators in the country, Mr. Rama also notified national media outlets that they had 24 hours to remove
Authentic Gaming expands into new markets with Optibet
Latvia
Authentic Gaming, has entered Latvia and Estonia for the first time after signing a deal with online casino and sportsbook operator, Optibet.
Optibet is one of the most trusted online casino operators in both countries, and holds around 50 per cent of the market in Latvia. Te partnership means Optibet players will gain access to live roulette games streamed from the floors of casinos around the world via the supplier’s Authentic Roulette platform.
Te deal includes games from the supplier’s just-launched Live Arena Studio in Malta. It is the largest live auto-roulette studio in the world, and contains six tables and four
all advertising connected to gambling from their publications and channels. Te media outlets were given the options to either comply with the changes or face consequences and have them forcefully removed.
In August 2018, President Ilir Meta vetoed legislation meant to reduce gambling taxes, stating: “Te gambling business model does not produce added value for society; on the contrary the expansion of this industry brings potential risk that impoverishes Albanian households and causes social drama.”
Already adopted legal changes limit the geographical location of casinos only to areas determined for tourism development or five- star hotels or tourist resort. Mr. Rama noted that although the number of casinos has halved since 2013, from 40 to 20, the government’s gambling tax revenue has increased to $54m (€47m) from $37m over this period.
Albania had more than 3,900 betting shops at present (approximately one per 730 local residents), setting what is believed to be a European record.
different game formats. Tis includes Authentic Gaming’s never-seen-before Blaze variant, which is set against a glitzy gameshow backdrop.
Jonas Delin, CEO of Authentic Gaming, said: “Tis is a breakthrough deal for us, and forms part of our strategy to enter regulated markets in Europe and beyond. Te Latvian market is very exciting as gaming laws prohibit Latvian based live dealer suppliers from targeting the local market, but through our partnership with Optibet we can swiftly establish Authentic Gaming as the market leader in live roulette.”
Chris Davis, Head of Casino at Lifland , said, "Te Latvian market is extremely limited in regards to its live casino offering but we intend to change that. We chose Authentic Gaming because of their high quality video stream, intuitive UI and player-driven functionality.”
UK
Te Ritz casino in Mayfair demonstrated the volatility of London’s VIP casino sector with losses of £11.7m reported in 2017.
Te loss follows profits of £8.9m in 2016. GGR dropped from £33m to £22.3m during the period although the casino’s owners, the Barclay brothers, revealed that footfall had been consistent referencing luck as being the key contributing factor.
“Efforts to encourage new Middle East and Far Eastern players remain focussed and business in 2018 is expected to be more fortuitous. Business in 2018 is expected to be more fortuitous,” the company said
GEORGIA – EveryMatrix has announced the recent integration of CasinoEngine with Adjarabet’s existing platform. Adjarabet’s end-users can now enjoy an unrivaled casino experience from leading providers and significant increases in RNG games and premium live casino options.
Through this deal, Adjarabet will, employ a pure integration of the CasinoEngine iGaming Integration Platform that permits operators to obtain top performance and get access via a single API to the entire product suite, integrated directly with its front-end, third party wallet and platform.
Tom Hutchinson, Director of Casino at Adjarabet, commented: “The CasinoEngine will allow us to launch the broad selection of Casino vendors offered by EveryMatrix onto the Adjarabet sites at a much faster rate than was possible before, solidifying our market leading position in Georgia and positioning us well to increase our market share in Armenia.”
Stian Hornsletten, Executive Director and CasinoEngine CEO, commented on the integration: “Adjarabet signing, and the present robust client portfolio, are a vindication of the investments we have made in recent years towards our long-term strategy of being product-leaders in niche gaming verticals.”
DENMARK – GLI President and CEO James Maida and a team of locally focused, global experts led by GLI EMEA Managing Director Martin Britton presented an informative, complimentary half-
day regulators seminar during the recently completed IAGR 2018 Conference.
Mr. Maida welcomed participants to the seminar and gave a brief update of GLI activity in jurisdictions around the world. He said: “It was both a pleasure and a privilege to present our half-day regulators seminar to such an esteemed group of industry colleagues. My thanks the outstanding team at IAGR for giving us the opportunity to host this valuable educational event during this year’s annual conference.”
“Set against the backdrop of an ever-changing global regulatory landscape, the thoughtfully curated topics we presented offered a great deal of relevant, timely, and useful information to help regulators around the world successfully overcome challenges and accomplish their goals and objectives. We appreciated the positive reaction from seminar attendees and look forward to partnering with IAGR for future educational events such as this,” Maida added.
NEWSWIRE / INTERACTIVE / MARKET DATA P21 EMEA
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