Sweden’s gambling regulator has slapped down a licensee’s attempts to circumvent the market’s online casino deposit limits, while the market’s top advertisers reported significant spending declines in 2020. 

On Tuesday, the Spelinspektionen regulatory body announced that online casino licensee Videoslots Ltd had engaged in a scheme in which customers were okayed to reverse months-old withdrawals, which allowed these customers to deposit more than the SEK5k (US$603) weekly limit that has been in place since last July. 

Spelinspektionen discovered Videoslots’ gambit during a check of how the operator was complying with the new limits, which were imposed as a means of ensuring locked-down Swedes didn’t gamble away the mortgage due to pandemic boredom. 

While Videoslots appeared to be enforcing the deposit limit for first-time customers, existing customers were allowed to reverse withdrawals that had been processed as far back as two months ago. Reversing these withdrawals allowed customers to top up their accounts far beyond the mandatory weekly limit.