The Bwin sports betting brand’s Russian-licensed site has reportedly undergone an ownership change as its website traffic continues to fall.

On Friday, Russian online gambling affiliate Bookmaker Ratings reported that Digital Betting LLC, the Russia-based entity under whose online sports betting license Bwin.ru operates in the country, was no longer controlled by local billionaire Alexander Mamut’s A&NN Investments.

Digital Betting’s new owner is listed as Nirevia Holdings Ltd, a Cyprus-based company that incorporated in August 2015. That’s about the extent of the public information available about Nirevia, although it added a new officer last March in the form of the equally opaque Intercorp Ltd.

Bwin.ru launched in November 2017 as a joint venture of Digital Betting and UK-listed online gambling giant GVC Holdings. Digital Betting boss Mamut pledged to spend big promoting the site via his online tech firm Rambler & Co, which controls some major Russian sports media properties, including the popular Championat (Championship) site.

Casino operator Hard Rock International (HRI) is claiming a world-first gaming innovation through online slots played live from its Atlantic City casino.

On Monday, HRI announced that it had teamed up with Israel-based gaming tech firm Softweave Ltd to offer Live Slots from its Hard Rock Atlantic City casino. The product, which Softweave has dubbed Winafar, is being offered by HRI’s New Jersey-licensed online gambling site HardRockCasino.com.

Live Slots involves cameras and microphones trained on physical slot machines in a designated room at HRI’s AC casino that currently features 12 machines offering five slots titles. Softweave says its Winafar tech can be incorporated into any slot machine simply by plugging in the Winafar box and setting up the cameras and microphones.

New Jersey-based customers can access Live Slots via their computer or mobile device and will be presented with a visual row of physical slot machines. If there’s a downside to Softweave’s tech, it’s that individual slots can only be enjoyed by a single player at a time, unlike the other gaming options available via the traditional live casino format, so you’ll have to wait patiently if someone decides to bogart a particular machine.

Cambodian casino operator NagaCorp saw its 2019 profits jump by one-third but warned that the coronavirus could negatively impact its 2020 performance.

Figures released Monday show NagaCorp’s gross gaming revenue hit $1.75b in 2019, a one-fifth improvement over 2018’s results. Operating profit was up 36.5% to $571.8m while after-tax profit rose 33.4% to a record $521.3m.

NagaCorp, which operates Cambodia’s only major integrated resort casino NagaWorld in the capital Phnom Penh, performed strongly last year across all gaming verticals. VIP gambling turnover rose 31% to $46.6b, while VIP revenue rose 16% to $1.24b as win rate slipped to 2.7% from 3% in 2018.

NagaCorp added a few more junket operator partners in 2019, which the company credited with goosing the VIP turnover figures, as well as the new higher table limits available at some of the NagaWorld’s Naga2 facility.

Operators understand that one of the most crucial things to deliver on are player payouts. To be perceived as holding back on paying out is hard to come back from. The Daily Fantasy Football Company (DFFC) might be learning that the hard way, as the Malta Gaming Authority (MGA) have announced the cancellation of their B2C gaming service license.

The MGA have declared DFFC to be in violation of several paragraphs of regulation 9 of the Gaming Compliance and Enforcement Regulations. Specifically, they list:

“The authorised person has failed to meet commitments to players in a timely manner, or the Authority has reason to believe that such failure is imminent following the €3,483.89 liabilities incurred by the Authorised Person towards player funds;

“The Authorised Person has failed to pay in a timely manner all amounts due to the Authority – specifically the Authorised Person failed to pay the relevant tax, compliance and true-up alignment contributions.”

The Iowa Racing and Gaming Commission (IRGC) wants to make it clear to gaming operators in the Hawkeye State that it’s in charge and that it’s keeping a hawk eye’s view over their activity.  The regulatory body held its monthly meeting last Tuesday, doling out several fines to casinos and venues that had violated its rules.  In total, three venues are now breaking out their wallets to cover $50,000 in penalties.

Prairie Meadows Casino Racetrack Hotel was presented with a gift in the form of a $20,000 fine for not holding a tighter grip on the reins during a horse race last year.  In August, Taruca, a five-year-old chestnut gelding, participated in a claiming race and took the victory by a massive eight lengths.  However, track officials realized they had made a mistake the following day and told the Iowa Board of Stewards (BoS) that the horse was allowed to run with an expired blood test, the Coggins test.

That incident was embarrassing for the track, and led to the dismissal of the employee responsible for verifying the Coggins test.  Taruca had also been claimed for purchase, but that purchase was denied by the BoS over the missing test and the gelding was disqualified from the race.  On arbitration by an administrative law judge, the claim was reinstated and Taruca was sold for $16,000.

The same month that Taruca was causing a ruckus at the racetrack, another horse, Jessica Glitters, was having difficulty of her own.  Trainer Robert Roe called the racetrack to list her for the Iowa Breeders’ Oaks race, but someone at the track screwed up and the horse was never entered.

As the number of deaths from the coronavirus continues to climb in mainland China, precautions are being taken elsewhere to thwart the spread of the virus. Officials in Macau had issued a call for casinos to temporarily halt operations for 15 days, and many have responded. As of the latest count, 23 casinos have temporarily turned off their lights in hopes that they will quickly be able to resume normal operations if the flu-like virus can be contained.

The latest casinos to agree to the halt are Sofitel Macau at Ponte 16, Legend Hotel and Rocks Hotel. Melco Resorts also announced that its Altira has shut down, just days after several casino operators had acknowledged that they were following protocol and locking their doors. The latest closure adds a total of 921 hotel rooms to the offline count until February 20, at the earliest.

Altira, Grand Harbour Hotel and a number of guesthouses have also followed suit, some willing to bring to a halt every aspect of their operations while they await further guidance. What was once a bustling city with lights rivaling those of Las Vegas now appears more like an abandoned complex where only the occasional person can be seen on the streets.

Many casino operators have donated millions of dollars toward efforts to stop the coronavirus from spreading and to help treat those who have been diagnosed as infected. To date, around $90 million has been contributed, but the operators are taking even bigger losses with the closure. In addition to not seeing money flow into their venues, they’re also shelling out more money in the way of refunds for hotel cancellations and commercial payments.

A cryptocurrency scammer is finally being brought to justice, and being made to pay back his victims. James Matthew Thomas, of Midland, Michigan, has been ordered to pay back $208,718 to victims who were duped into thinking they had perhaps invested in CoinPoint, reports the Great Falls Tribune.

Thomas, 35, pleaded guilty in October to wire fraud and money lending charges. These charges originated from Thomas’ scheme to convince victims he worked for CoinPoint, and was seeking investors for the company. He promised returns of 30% to 40% in just a few days’ time.

An individual named in court as Victim 1 sent Thomas $6,948 in cryptocurrency. Thomas then returned a roughly 30% return, as promised, in the amount of $9,203. This got Victim 1 excited, recruiting a second victim, family and friends to invest more. Altogether, another $685,000 was sent to Thomas for new investments.

When Victim 1 contacted Thomas to check up on the new investments at a coinpointpartners.net email address, Thomas replied that the funds were doing well. Victim 1 even received emails from other supposed CoinPoint employees.

William Hill, the bookmaker with its eyes firmly set on the growing US sports gambling market, is filling in all the pieces to its betting puzzle. With a little crafty negotiating, it will be an all-encompassing operator that can cover every aspect of the industry. The UK-based company is close to being able to fit one more piece into the puzzle as it appears back at the table with CBS Sports to discuss an online media deal. After talks between the two broke down last month, they’re back on now, and a deal is said to be “imminent.”

The Sunday Times reported on the renewed talks, adding that William Hill approached CBS to try to give the discussion a second go. The media outlet adds that the two are in the “final stage of negotiations,” which will help the bookmaker offer a more robust platform and better compete against other operators that are also in the process of securing their own deals.

Both GVC and Flutter Entertainment have already established tentative media partnerships that will give the companies a substantial lead on the competition. GVC, along with MGM Resorts, is partnered with Yahoo Sports and, Provided the deal is allowed to go through, Flutter is going to purchase The Stars Group for just over $12 billion, giving it access to Fox Sports and Fox Bet through a deal between TSG and Fox Bet from May of last year.

It is also an opportunity for William Hill to combat the recent deal between Penn National Gaming and Barstool Sports. That partnership gives Penn National access to a growing sports media company with a substantial fan base and a younger demographic, the exact components that bookmakers are looking for.

While the world is growing ever concerned about the outbreak of the coronavirus, Louisiana residents are worried about an outbreak of the norovirus at a southwestern casino. 200 have suddenly fallen ill, according to state health officials.

According to a statement by the Louisiana Department of Health, they confirmed on February 6 that 200 patrons at the L’Auberge Casino in Lake Charles reported contracting the illness. Lake Charles is located about 200 miles to the west of New Orleans.

This is a highly contagious gastrointestinal illness that causes severe stomach pain, vomiting and diarrhea.

Dr. Lacey Cavanaugh, the department’s regional medical director found that several hundred people had attended events at the casino on the first weekend of February and that at least 200 have reported having symptoms of the virus.

Voters of Missouri will decide if they want to legalize riverboat casinos on the Osage River. Currently, riverboat gambling operations are only allowed on the Missouri and Mississippi rivers, but that could be changing soon if a Missouri House bill to change the state’s constitution passes.

A bill was proposed in late January by state representative Rocky Miller (R-Lake Ozark), who offered an amended version of the House Joint Resolution Bill 87. This version removed the Lake of the Ozarks from the resolution.

While supporting the bill, Miller seemed a bit lackluster in his support for the legislation. “Why in the world would I do this? I didn’t come up here to do this,” he explained. “I literally don’t know if I really care about this.”

He pointed out that the legislation does not actually change or add gaming on the Osage River, but pointed out that it gives voters the opportunity to weigh in on the subject. “If we don’t do this, we’re going to have an initiative petition — we’re probably going to have one anyway — but in this case, we have the ability to actually move on it,” he stated. “If we don’t have this piece in place — if we don’t have the Osage River added to this change in the Constitution, of course we know we can’t change the Constitution.”

With every state in the U.S. getting to regulate gambling however they prefer, it can make for a messy situation for operators. Applying the correct rules, and denying the right customers, becomes key. GeoComply has solutions for that, and CEO David Briggs spoke with our Becky Liggero Fontana at G2E Vegas about it.

As the U.S. market has evolved, the solutions needed for it have had to change too. Liggero Fontana asked Briggs to expand on how things have changed. “It’s been quite a while, but I mean, we really created the company to solve a problem that we saw happening that it was unique to the U.S. market,” he said. “Compared to other jurisdictions, which is our federal or national, the U.S. has a gaming regulatory regime which is always at state level. So if digital was ever going to happen here, it would again be at the state level. That was the view that we took, anyway. And if you want to have gaming in a single state, you basically have to make sure that that gaming doesn’t happen in the neighboring states. And some of these states have cities that naturally flow across state lines.”

GeoComply saw the need to solve this, because existing methods of determining a player’s location just weren’t good enough. “The penalty for taking somebody from the wrong side of the state line is up to five years in jail, not just for the operator but also for the payment method used by the player,” he emphasized. “So those are pretty serious penalties, so the geofencing system would have to have been really, really strong, and yet a really good user experience. And that was our vision.”

As online, digital gaming has flourished, many U.S. land based operators have fought it tooth and nail. “I think some people that are wedded to the notion of cannibalization will never give up on that notion,” Briggs noted. “It seems incredible to me. I’ve been in the industry for 20 years, and I have never seen the impact of cannibalization that matches any of the hysteria that I’ve heard discussed particularly in the U.S. market. I mean, I remember in the poker world, poker rooms were dying all over the world, and then online poker came along and it rejuvenated them because it introduced a whole new generation of people that would play online, they’ve qualified, and they go to the World Series of Poker. And the World Series of Poker became bigger and bigger and bigger.”