Monthly Archives: July 2017

Macau junkets seek higher capital reserves for new operators

Macau casino junket operators should be required to maintain significantly higher capital reserves to keep pace with the resurgent VIP gambling market and ensure investor confidence, according to a local junket rep.

On Sunday, Macau broadcaster TDM featured an interview with Kwok Chi Chung, the head of Macau’s Association of Gaming and Entertainment Promoters, which represents junket interests in the world’s top casino gambling hub.

The current capital deposit threshold for Macau-registered junkets is a mere MOP 100k (US $12,500). In April 2016, Macau’s Gaming Inspection and Coordination Bureau proposed boosting this sum to MOP 10m ($1.25m). On Sunday, Kwok went even further, suggesting the reserve fund should be raised to MOP 50m ($6.2m) to ensure new junkets are capable of withstanding the occasionally wild variance of Macau’s VIP gambling market.

The following day, Kwok told GGRAsia that the increased capital requirements were needed to keep pace with the “multibillions” of patacas that many Macau junkets were turning over on a monthly basis. Kwok said the roughly 120 registered junkets that survived Macau’s recent downturn “would not be affected” by the change.

WSOP Main Event Final Table: International Flavor, November Nine Experience Set Tone for Televised July Finale

For the first time in nearly 10 years, the wait to know who will be the next WSOP Main Event champion has been reduced to days, not months. The table […]

The post WSOP Main Event Final Table: International Flavor, November Nine Experience Set Tone for Televised July Finale appeared first on .

Czech Republic well represented, Jan Rehola and Dr. Robert Skalina will give presentations during CEEGC 2017

18 July 2017, Budapest: The organizers of CEEGC2017 are honored to announce two Czech speakers for the second edition of the Central and Eastern European Gaming Conference. An event which is going to take place between 19-20 September at the Kempinski Corvinus Budapest.

The Czech Republic’s online gambling market has been in the scope of the industry this year and we can say the Prague Gaming Summit has managed to achieve its goal. The goal of taking the industry’s experts into one room with the Czech regulators in order to get a better understanding of the regulatory framework and why not, discuss possible burden easy for the operators.

While the regulators present at the event have made a clear statement that new amendments will follow shortly in June, this has not been materialized yet. It seems that the Czech regulators want to sort out the problems they had with the first regulation law and work out the best possible amendments that will help make the market more competitive for remote operators.

Our sources who will be present during CEEGC, have pointed out that there will be some new guidelines coming out and a methodology on Bonuses and Max Hourly Loss will also be published. These materials will also be followed by the announcement of the newly licensed operators. It seems that the Czech Republic’s Ministry of Finance have their hands full and can’t juggle the sensitive manners of the amendments since they have to recheck the whole land based sector, where all land based operators have to get a new license by the end of the year.

Slovakia blacklists first 10 online gambling operators

Slovakia’s government has published its inaugural blacklist of online gambling domains considered to be serving local punters without local approval.

On Monday, Slovakia’s finance ministry released the first 10 names on the country’s online gambling naughty list. The rogues’ gallery of domains includes familiar faces such as 888 Holdings, Bet365, Bet-at-Home, Bwin, William Hill and 1xbet, along with the Curacao-licensed Eatsleepbet.com plus the Malta-licensed LVbet.com and Kajot-casino.com.

The ministry issued a note on Monday saying it had issued warning notices to 17 online gambling operators, 10 of which ended up on the blacklist. Two other operators had withdrawn their services from Slovakia voluntarily, while five more had been given 10 days in which to wrap up their local operations before the whip comes down.

Some operators had exited the Slovakian market in recent months after the government announced it would begin enforcing its new gambling regulations, under which online sports betting licensees must pay 27% tax on their gross gaming revenue from local punters. Online casino and poker activity remains the sole responsibility of the state-owned TIPOS national lottery.

PokerStars exit Colombia’s overly restrictive online gambling market

PokerStars has withdrawn real-money online gambling services from the Colombian market after the local gaming regulator began enforcing its online blacklist.

On Friday, PokerStars emailed its Colombian customers to alert them that they would no longer be able to enjoy real-money poker play effective Monday (17) “due to local licensing requirements.” Stars insisted that free-to-play games were still accessible in Colombia and that service in other Latin American jurisdictions would remain unaffected.

The message claimed Stars “has been, and will continue to be, in positive and proactive discussions” with Colombian officials and the site hopes to resume real-money activity in Colombia “in the future.”

Stars reportedly took issue with local regulator Coljuegos’ unwillingness to allow its online poker licensees to share liquidity with other jurisdictions, as well as the requirement that licensees base their servers in Colombia.

South Korea’s foreigner-only casino sales bounce back in 2016

After a year of decline, South Korea’s foreigner-only casinos have rebounded in 2016.

Data from the National Gambling Control Commission showed that the sector’s combined sales climbed 2.6 percent in 2016 to reach KRW1.28 trillion (US$1.14 billion).

For the third year in a row, Kangwon Land sales continue to outstrip the combined sales of the foreigner-only sector. Kangwon Land, the only gaming venue in which South Koreans are allowed to gamble, saw its sales rise to 4.3 percent year-on-year to reach KRW1.63 trillion last year.

The country had 17 casinos in 2016, including Kangwon Land.

Resorts Digital Gaming LLC. to launch hassle-free, next generation of daily fantasy sports in New Jersey on www.FastPick.com

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. – June 18th, 2017 – Resorts Digital Gaming, LLC is thrilled to announce their plans to launch the next wave of innovation in Daily Fantasy Sports (“DFS”) at www.FastPick.com. Resorts Digital Gaming is the interactive arm of Resorts Casino Hotel Atlantic City, the first casino to open in the state of New Jersey, and operates Internet gambling websites www.resortscasino.com  and www.mohegansuncasino.com.

Created to provide a fair and sensible alternative for fantasy sports fans, the FastPick development team surveyed the DFS terrain, studied player feedback and realized the need for a modified platform that promised equitable gameplay. One of the chief findings was that players lose interest when they realize they have little chance of winning as they’re competing against traditional “professional” DFS players with far more time, knowledge and in some cases, the benefit of assistive technology.

The site, in partnership with Sport Analytics and Data Corp. (“Sport AD”) and FSB Technology (UK) (“FSB”), will feature head-to-head player match-ups in a truly one-of-a-kind online DFS experience reflective of the unique offerings players have come to expect from Resorts Digital Gaming. Designed on a sleek and user-friendly interface utilizing the top DFS technology, FastPick.com will make Daily Fantasy Sports more enjoyable and rewarding than previously experienced on other DFS sites.

At present, FastPick is only available to persons physically located in the State of New Jersey. Players can open and fund a FastPick account safely and easily. The platform presents players with a wide range of pre-selected player match-ups across all major sports leagues. Players choose three or more matchups and the results are determined based on standard fantasy sports scoring. Examples of the types of match-ups are:

MIGS and iGaming business form strategic partnership

18 July, 2017 (Malta) – The organising company of (MIGS) Malta iGaming Seminar and iGaming Business, the leading publishing house and event specialists, have announced a partnership to jointly organise the Malta-based c-level iGaming Conference.

Michael Caselli, Editor in Chief of iGaming Business said, “We are very excited about this new partnership. We have been a fan and a major supporter of MIGS since its early years and are happy now that we are planting some seeds in Malta”.

The two companies have started to work on new ambitious plans for MIGS and as a result of this new partnership, it has been decided to move the event to next year.

Alex Pratt, Managing Director of iGaming Business said, “Owing to the timing of the negotiations to close this deal, both teams feel that there is too little of a time-frame to bring the necessary resources together and pull off an event better than our delegates are accustomed to attending.  We will start immediately to set new dates and look forward to working to develop MIGS further into the leading executive conference in Malta.”