Super Rugby Unlocked is set to continue this weekend, with the participation of the Springboks in the 2020 Rugby Championship under a cloud. The South African national side is on the verge of pulling out of the Rugby Championship in Australia, citing the concerns over player welfare.

South Africa may be forced to send a development side to Australia, with several First XV players lacking match fitness in the domestic competition. The match of the round sees the Stormers do battle with the Lions.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lnz9-khYhNk?feature=oembed&w=640&h=360]

Cheetahs vs Bulls

Things have to be pretty bad when Las Vegas casinos are opting to shut down for part of the week. That’s the case with Wynn Resorts’ Encore, which will only operate on a Thursday to Sunday basis.

The Encore has been operating on a 24/7 basis, but citing weak demand, Wynn says it had to cut the resort’s hours. They’ll keep it that way until “consumer demand for Las Vegas increases,” the company said.

For Wynn fans who are let down by the news, the Wynn Las Vegas just next door will continue operating at all hours of the day, every day of the week. Sadly though, employees won’t get to take the short stroll to save their jobs.

Wynn wouldn’t immediately confirm how many employee cuts would be necessary, but it did imply there could be some. “We have not yet determined the number of employees who will be furloughed as a result of the reduction in operating hours,” a Wynn spokesperson stated.

Gambling operators might want to get started on Bitcoin development, but their development teams simply don’t understand the concepts enough, or need a leg up on how to code for the blockchain. The Bitcoin Association is now addressing those needs, announcing a partnership with Saxion University of Applied Sciences for a new Bitcoin SV-focused massive open online course (MOOC)

The partnership is expected to produce four MOOCs, looking at the power made possible by Bitcoin SV’s (BSV) protocol and massively scaling blockchain, as well as specifics on how to build applications for BSV. All of the MOOCs, including assessments, will be free of charge and offer certificates upon completion, with the first launching in early 2021.

The press release announcing the new curriculum notes the first course will focus on the basics of Bitcoin for decision makers. Courses offered later on will look at the technical side of Bitcoin. Those interested in the courses can already register their intent to sign up.

This addresses a clear need by most of the business world to upskill their internal development teams for Bitcoin development. While the BSV blockchain is capable of massive new opportunities, too few know how to build for it, and the Bitcoin Association has been focused on addressing those needs in 2020, also launching the Bitcoin Wiki, with informational articles and tools for developers.

On January 1 of last year, Sweden introduced a new sports-centric match-fixing council, whose sole purpose was to uncover any cheating taking place in sports and help improve integrity among sports organizations. It’s a noble cause and one that has been addressed in countries around the world continuously, and Sweden felt confident that the new regulatory body would have a huge impact on cleaning up the athletic market. If you ask Svenska Spel, though, the match-fixing council isn’t living up to the hype. 

An article just appeared in Sweden’s Aftonbladet newspaper that had been penned by the CEO of Svenska Spel, Patrick Hofbauer, and the General Secretary of the Swedish Football Association, Håkan Sjöstrand. The opinion piece asserts that corruption and match—fixing are ruining sports for everyone and that hopes had been high that the match-fixing council would put a stop to the cheaters and scammers. However, Hofbauer and Sjöstrand point out that nothing has changed in the past almost two years. As a result, they want a complete overhaul of the failing system.

The two explain that “if Sweden as a country took the fight against organized crime in sports very seriously, we would sign the Council of Europe’s convention against manipulation in sports. The Convention provides a clear description of the structures and commitments required for a national platform to stand strong in the fight against match-fixing. If the convention becomes Swedish law, several obstacles are also removed that today make the work more difficult.”

For whatever reason, Sweden has decided to ignore the widely accepted the joint European effort to address match-fixing in sports. There were 51 countries that jumped on the opportunity when the framework was put together, but Sweden, along with a handful of other countries, stayed on the bench. Denmark, Finland and Norway joined the field in 2014, but Sweden – the only Scandinavian country not to join – has remained with other countries that apparently don’t want to be more proactive in sports protection. 

Artificial intelligence (AI) has continued to find new avenues of success over the past several years, guided by innovation that has significantly improved how it can interact with individuals. The COVID-19 saga has increased the need for AI-based solutions to help the world stay focused while in quarantine or otherwise shut off from human contact. Budding athletes with dreams of one day making it in the big leagues have found those dreams dashed, no longer able to access practices or coaches. Fortunately, there’s an app for that. Enter an AI-based coach, Mustard. 

Mustard is a sports technology solution that uses AI to help athletes improve their game, starting with baseball. According to the app’s developers, Mustard can analyze an athlete’s movements and offer suggestions on what needs to be changed to make improvements. While it has launched in beta mode for baseball, it will soon be adding a golf component before moving into football, which will come thanks to the involvement of New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees and professional football coach Tom House. 

According to users, it actually works. Eddie McCartney is one of those who stands behind the app. He is a 14-year-old aspiring baseball pitcher who began using Mustard two months ago. However, he admits that it has already helped him with his motion and mechanics. What makes the app even better is that it only needs a smartphone (so it can take advantage of the camera) and it’s completely free to use. 

Mustard co-founder and CEO Rocky Collis, who is also a former minor league baseball pitcher, explains, “There is not a product out like it now. This is one of the world’s all-time great coaches giving you personalized lesson plans automatically and immediately. The technology works from every camera angle… We are essentially taking what Tom House does with Nolan Ryan and Drew Brees and making it available to kids all over the world.”

Golden Week, the annual Chinese holiday period, wasn’t expected to give Macau’s casinos a meteoric boost, but there was still hope that the numbers would be strong enough to ease the sting felt by the COVID-19 pandemic. While traffic into the city has remained low compared to last year, there has been a little bit of good news. The gross gaming revenue (GGR) reported by casinos since the beginning of the month remains much lower than it was in 2019, but, compared to last month, the revenue is more than double. 

According to a report released by Sanford C. Bernstein brokerage analysts Vitaly Umansky, Tianjiao Yu and Kelsey Zhu this past Monday, Macau GGR jumped as October began. Across the first 11 days of the month, compared to what was reported in September, casinos took in 221% more in terms of the month-to-date average daily rate. That figure came in at $30 million for the period compared to the $9.2 million reported last month.

However, as huge of an increase as it may seem, it is still 72% less than it was a year earlier, which means Macau still has a lot of work to do to make a full recovery. Golden Week was a disappointment all the way around, with visitor arrivals losing 86% of the volume from last year, even though this year’s period included an extra day. Still, looking on the bright side, the average daily traffic reached 17,020 on October 8, substantially higher than the 5,000 that was averaged this past August. 

China has started to relax the visa rules for travel to Macau, but there are still some restrictions in place that are keeping visitors away. Not until these restrictions are removed, and traveler confidence picks up, will Macau be able to see an improvement. Until then, visiting the city from mainland China is a chore that requires a COVID-19 test administered no more than seven days before the trip. 

When Penn National Gaming (PNG) announced that it wanted to purchase a huge chunk of Barstool Sports at the beginning of the year, some viewed the acquisition as premature. However, fast forward to September, and the sentiment changed, thanks to the revenue PNG is receiving from the deal. The casino operator that month also introduced a Barstool sports gambling app in Pennsylvania to test both the market and the software, and has once again shown that the decision to purchase the company was one of the smartest in the casino industry this year. PNG is so happy with the Barstool sports gambling app that it wants to put it in every legal state as quickly as possible.

According to Jay Snowden, the CEO of PNG, the Barstool app saw 21,000 new downloads every day when it launched the first weekend of September. He made the comments on an episode of Liz Claman’s The Claman Countdown on Fox Business, adding that it was only made available in the Keystone State at first, but Michigan is coming next month, with further expansion right on the heels of that launch. Says Snowden, “As you get into 2021, I think you should expect for us to be in every state that’s legal, where we operate and can launch by the end of 2021. We’ll be in well over a dozen states by the end of the calendar year.”

Snowden pulled up short on explaining the actual revenue the app has produced. However, we know that the state took in a record $18.3 million in August, a month-over-month improvement of 122%, and that was before the NFL season launched. With the Barstool Sportsbook app launching almost at the same time as professional football, which always attracts the most sports wagers, it’s a safe assumption that PNG is getting a nice windfall from Pennsylvania online sports gambling and Barstool, despite having not spent a penny on paid marketing or advertising the first two weeks the app was available. 

In addition to being able to enter other legal states, Snowden expects states that haven’t even considered sports gambling legalization to change their minds, a stance that many have asserted since COVID-19 forced millions of dollars in state revenue losses. He states, “It’s very high on the priority list right now because the couple of states like New Jersey and Pennsylvania had authorized [sports betting] pre-COVID. People went online, they were still able to participate in casino gambling, sports wagering, whatever sports were available, and other states took note of that. I think you’re going to see this proliferate much quicker going forward than maybe most thought about at the beginning of this year.”

Universal Music Group (UMG) has announced plans to enter the hotel and casino market with a $1.2 billion development for a new location in Biloxi, Mississippi.

The new 266-acre property will target the old Broadwater resort, which is expected to be one of three hotel developments by UMG. The new Biloxi establishment will provide direct competition for the Hard Rock Casino.

UMG also chose Atlanta, Biloxi and Orlando as the locations for their new foray into the hospitality and casino business. The UMG includes companies such as Capitol Records, Def Jam recordings and Abbey Road Studios in its stable. The hotels and casinos will be themed to reflect the company’s connection to its entertainment heritage.

Biloxi Mayor Andrew Gilich was delighted with the opportunities that the new hotel and casino will bring to the local community:

If it could, Australia would have an invisible forcefield surrounding the country that would keep offshore gambling sites from crossing its borders. Any iGaming operator wanting to provide services to Australians must have a license, and this isn’t possible for anyone outside the country. However, this hasn’t stopped some entities from sneaking into the country, and this is where the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) comes in. The government-led body continues to find and stop offenders, and has just netted two more victims. Users of Fortune Clock Casino and Dinkum pokies need to withdrawal their funds as soon as possible, or risk losing their money permanently. 

The ACMA is going to ask Internet Service Providers (ISP) to block access to both Fortune Clock and Dinkum, which it determined was illegally targeting the Australian online gaming market. The entity had reportedly received a number of complaints about the casinos’ operations, including issues with poor customer satisfaction and a lack of ability to withdraw winnings. Those complaints led to an ACMA investigation, culminating in their expected banishment from Australian land. 

The ACMA conducts its activity in accordance with the Interactive Gambling Act of 2001, and has control over who can, or can’t, provide online gaming services in the country. The legislation was updated last year to give the group more control, and it began cracking down on illegal iGaming operators last November. Since then, it has sent out 150 requests to ISPs to have them block illegal websites, 28 of which were submitted since January of this year. 

Australia hopes that, by limiting iGaming to licensed operators, it can protect all gamblers, all the time. This past April, as the issue was becoming more of a hot topic, the New South Wales Office of Responsible Gambling Director Natalie Wright said, “For people that do want to gamble online, you should only use services licensed in Australia, as there are consumer safeguards in place and responsible gambling options, such as the ability to set time and expenditure limits. Overseas gambling websites are illegal in Australia, and people who use them face additional risks than when they gamble with a licensed Australian operator.”

Liverpool casinos will be the first victims of the U.K. government’s tougher stance towards COVID restrictions. From the 14th October all casinos and betting shops in the Merseyside area will be forced into a temporary closure to slow the spread of COVID.

Prime Minister Boris Johnston announced a three-tier system for restrictions, depending on the risk of transmission in the area. The Liverpool area falls into the top tier risk of infection, meaning all tier three areas will be under a temporary closure order until October 25th at the earliest.

Prime Minister Boris Johnston was forced to defend the restrictions during his address to the U.K. parliament. “This is not how we want to live our lives, but this is the narrow path we must tread between the social and economic trauma of a full lockdown and the massive human and economic cost of an uncontained epidemic,” he said.

In a statement on their website, the Betting and Gaming Council (BGC) urged the government to consider the implications of temporary closures:

Thailand’s anti-online gambling efforts continue to show results, while Malaysia’s crackdowns keep exposing crooked cops.

Earlier this month, Thai police staged raids in multiple cities that led to the arrest of 25 suspects accused of running six unauthorized online gambling sites based around a ‘UFA’ brand. Police seized the usual crop of computers, phones and cash, then transferred the suspects to Bangkok for interrogation.

Leads generated from those interrogations led to this week’s arrests of four more suspects in Bangkok, including the alleged ringleader, a 24-year-old named Tantai Narongkul, who reportedly admitted to operating nine illegal sites branded with variations on UFA, Sexygame and SSgame.

This week’s arrests were accompanied by a much larger haul of material goods, including 11 luxury cars worth a combined THB75m (US$2.4m) and THB1m in cash. Tantai’s ring reportedly enjoyed turnover of THB15b ($480m) in the past six months from the gambling ring, which based its servers outside the country.

The gambling monopoly in Canada’s four Atlantic provinces suffered a profit shortfall in its most recent fiscal year due to COVID-19 and is frantically beefing up its digital offering in case the pandemic sticks around.

On Tuesday, the Atlantic Lottery Corporation (ALC), which holds a gambling monopoly in the provinces of New Brunswick, Newfoundland & Labrador, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island, reported a profit of C$395.4m (US$301m) in the 12 months ending March 31, down 6.2% from fiscal 2018-19.

Revenue fell 5% year-on-year to C$725.5m as overall sales fell and the ALC doled out an additional C$14m in prizes to players. Lottery draw ticket sales were down 8% to C$164m, Scratch’N Win sales slipped 2.5% to C$78m and Breakopen ticket revenue tumbled 13.7% to C$37.8m. The Breakopen product underwent some tinkering that ALC says retailers and players “did not adopt and transition to … as anticipated.”

The only lottery category that posted positive growth in 2019-20 was iGames, as digital instant win sales more than doubled year-on-year to C$10.6m although iBingo slipped C$600k to C$2m.

China’s anti-gambling campaign shows no sign of letting up, with the country putting international companies on notice of possible criminal penalties.

On Tuesday, state-run media reported that the Chinese Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress was reviewing an amendment to the country’s laws that would officially criminalize overseas entities that attempt to lure Chinese citizens for gambling purposes.

This review coincides with an Australian probe into casino operator Crown Resorts that has at times put great focus on the company’s promotion of gambling to customers on the Chinese mainland, in violation of Chinese law. Those ill-advised promotions ultimately resulted in the arrest and lengthy detention in China of a number of Crown staffers.

In August, China’s Ministry of Culture & Tourism announced a ‘blacklist’ of overseas gambling destinations, although the announcement failed to actually name the countries that would be included on this list.   

Germany-facing sports betting operators are hailing their shiny new licenses while their affiliate marketing partners are confused and nervous.

Last Friday saw the region council of Darmstadt in the German state of Hesse issue its ‘white list’ of the first nationwide sports betting permits just days ahead of the October 15 implementation of the country’s new online gambling ‘toleration’ regime. The 15 licensees are said to account for around 75% of Germany’s betting market volume last year.

GVC Holdings claimed four licenses for its Bwin, Gamebookers, Ladbrokes and Sportingbet brands. Also making the grade was Bet365, BetVictor, Gauselmann Group’s Cashpoint Malta, Greenvest Betting’s Neo.bet site, Berlin-based IBC Sportsbetting’s WettArena brand, Jaxx, Novomatic’s Admiral Sportwetten (which shut its German retail betting shops in May), Playtech’s HPYBET brand, TipBet, Tipico and TipWin.

The licenses were only issued due to the recent withdrawal of a court challenge filed by Austrian bookmaker Vierklee, which threw Germany’s licensing plans into disarray in April by challenging the transparency of the licensing process. (No doubt Vierklee’s license will be among the next batch issued by the grateful Darmstadt regulators.)