Daily Archives: February 7, 2022

VALETTA,Malta, Feb. 7, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Kindred's commitment to contribute to a sustainable industry across all markets has continued throughout 2021. In the fourth quarter of 2021, Kindred's share of revenue from harmful gambling increased slightly to 4.0 per cent.

In February last year, Kindred Group plc (Kindred) started to communicate about its journey towards zero. The share of revenue from harmful gambling has fluctuated somewhat over the year and for the fourth quarter of 2021 it increased to 4.0 per cent from 3.3 per cent in the third quarter of 2021. The increase is based on different factors. One of them is that, historically, the fourth quarter of the year sees an increase in high-risk gambling. This due to the holiday season which can be a sensitive time for some people. Another factor is that Kindred ceased all services towards Dutch residents at the end of September which led to an increase in the numbers reported. Compared to the fourth quarter of 2020, the value decreased slightly.

Although Kindred invested more resources into their Responsible Gambling team during this period, this also highlights the necessity to focus on earlier interventions which can be automated for the lower risk group of customers. An early engagement is important to disrupt the behavioural development, which Kindred is focusing on achieving.

Global statistics from Kindred Group

Q1 2021

Q2 2021

Q3 2021

Q42021*

Share of gross winnings revenue from high-risk players

3.9%

4.3%

3.3%

4.0%

Improvement effect after interventions

76.6%

76.9%

64.9%

79.2%

*90 day rolling period between21 September and 31 December 2021

"Despite the share of revenue from harmful gambling increasing this quarter we remain dedicated and focused on our journey towards zero," says Henrik Tjrnstrm, CEO of Kindred Group. "While we are not pleased that the trend remains flat over the last year, we have known from the beginning that we won't solve this overnight, and we know there is still work to do. We have committed ourselves to this ambition and we will continue to work towards reaching zero per cent revenue from harmful gambling."

"In line with our roadmap, we look forward to even more targeted deliveries planned for 2022. While 2021 has been focused on research initiatives and have better data driven understanding of player dynamics, we will in 2022 continue the work to increase our capacity to effectively engage better and faster with detected customers. Besides additional self-control tools and optimised customer communication, will we launch automated interventions for lower risk groups." concludes Tjrnstrm.

During the year, Kindred continued to engage with researchers to further build on the approach to accurately identify markers of gambling harm and improve on existing measures to help customers stay in control of their gambling. The most prominent result of 2021, was a peer-reviewed research paperlooking into gambling harm markers that can be identified through online behavioural tracking.

About our journey towards zero

Kindred Group is committed to transform gambling by being a trusted source of entertainment that contributes positively to society. Therefore, Kindred has set an ambition to reach zero per cent revenue from harmful gambling by 2023 and to report this metric on a quarterly basis. This is done to increase transparency, to support a fact-based dialogue about harmful gambling, and to raise awareness of the Group's sustainability work. To read more, visit: http://www.kindredgroup.com/zero.

For more information, contact:

Maria Angell Dupont, External Communications Manager, Kindred Group[emailprotected] +46 72 165 15 17

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Kindred's revenue from harmful gambling 4.0 per cent in the fourth quarter - PRNewswire

Online sports betting has arrived in New York.

The Empire State approved sports gambling late last year and it went live in New York on Jan. 8, 2022.

Want to bet on the Super Bowl?

Check out these betting sites.

The early results have been nothing short of spectacular as New York set a record for the amount bet on sports, and tax revenues, too, in the very first month after its rollout.

According to a report on Syracuse.com, bettors placed more than $1.6 billion in wagers on the outcomes of games and related propositions, according to the State Gaming Commission. That beat the old record handle of $1.3 billion set by New Jersey bettors in October.

Thats not all. The state earned $57.6 million in taxes on the revenues earned by sports betting operators in January. Thats more than double the previous record set by Pennsylvania in November. New Yorks tax rate on sports betting revenues is 51%, while Pennsylvania has the second highest rate at 36%.

Right now six companies betting apps are available in New York. They are Draft Kings, FanDuel, BetRivers, BetMGM, Caesars and PointsBet.

And its not too late to open an account and most all of them are giving special incentives to sign up, like cash back, free bets and ridiculous cant-lose odds.

These mobile version apps allows bettors to place wagers via their smartphones or other devices, all in the comfort of their homes.

No longer will Staten Islanders or other New Yorkers have to camp out in a neighboring state to place bets.

State residents can bet on professional and college sports. The NFL, college football and the NBA usually draw the most action.

However, wagers on in-state college teams, such as St. Johns, Syracuse and Wagner College and other schools, are still prohibited for both home and road games even if played in another state.

Note: Online/mobile sports betting is now legal in New York state, but wagers on in-state college teams, such as St. Johns and Wagner College, are still prohibited for both home and road games even if played in another state.

If you or a loved one has questions or needs to talk to a professional about gambling, call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit 1800gambler.net for more information.

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Online gambling: What sports betting apps are available in New York? - SILive.com

Casino technologists and designers have become expert in the art of manipulation (something we also see in grocery store layouts). By now, most of us know the tricks casinos use to compel people to wager more. No windows, no clocks, a labyrinthine floor layout that keeps people stuck inside, sitting and playing. Slot machines have irresistible sounds and colors, and some give payouts that arent even as big as the bet but still activate the I won portion of the brain.

Wagering apps, whether for sports or casino bets, use all those tricks and add a whole new set developed to keep people engaged with social media on their phones by engaging our desires for instant gratification. There is a race to the bottom of the brain stem, Tristan Harris, a former Google design ethicist, said in a 2017 TED Talk. Liraz Margalit, a digital psychologist in Tel Aviv, told me that mobile app makers tone down the colors and sounds for first-time gamblers so as not to scare them off. App designers have taken research done to help people with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and applied it to gamblers, she says.

A 2018 article in Gaming Law Review explains that casinos, both physical and virtual, try to induce a state of attenuated thought, or dissociation, by eliminating transactional frictions. The bet again function saves a players previous bet size and payline choices, while electronic funds transfer allows them to keep playing when their original stake runs out. Anything that can be done to break people out of their trance, then, is for the better. One of the most effective policy changes in terms of reducing gambling expenditure was the introduction of smoking bans that caused gamblers to take a break and leave the gambling venue to smoke, the authors wrote.

I read transcripts of recent conference calls in which gambling executives described their strategies to Wall Street analysts. As you can imagine, finding ways to limit wagering was not high on their list of priorities. Instead most of the talk was about the costly inducements that the companies are offering to attract new players, hoping to get them to stay. The terms of art are TOD and LTV: time on device and lifetime value.

Here are two remarks:

Jason K. Park, chief financial officer of DraftKings: This is a product that lends itself to a little bit of egging and elbowing and ribbing and talking trash with your friends or people that are in your network. And to have all of that embedded within your favorite app I think will drive retention for sure but also increase levels of play in monetization, new sport introduction, all of that.

Richard Schwartz, chief executive officer of Rush Street Interactive: When youre betting on things like sports and casino, you want to be able to enter the app and do a very quick face ID. Get in there, play, have it available on your phone very easily and accessible. He added that there are limited markets where we have some friction that were very eager to get rid of.

Theres nothing illegal about any of this, of course, but gambling executives understandable desire to add customers and get them to spend more takes on a different complexion when you consider that some customers have a hard time saying no and may be gambling with money they cannot afford to lose.

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Opinion | What's New for This Super Bowl? The NFL's Full Embrace of Gambling. - The New York Times

Five police officers were demoted for turning a blind eye to allow gambling venues to operate in their areas of jurisdiction. Those officers were from Khu Kot Police Station in Pathum Thani and Bang Sao Thong Police Station in Samut Prakan, where officers busted two large gambling operations and made dozens of arrests. The officers were demoted due to their recklessness and ordered to transfer to the positions at the Provincial Police Region 1.

On Saturday, the Commissioner of Provincial Police Region 1, Jiraphat Phumjit, shared that there were two gambling venues raided Pathum Thani and Samut Prakan. More than 80 alleged gamblers were arrested. Officers also seized gambling equipment and more than 160,000 baht. Besides breaking the gambling law, the case also violates Covid-19 prevention measures that prohibit large gatherings.

In a further investigation, authorities found that a number of senior officers acted recklessly and allowed the venues to operate. The five demoted officers include a superintendent, deputy superintendent, suppression inspector, and investigation inspector. Those will be moved to work closely under the watch of superior officers at the Provincial Police Region 1 until further notice.

SOURCES: Sanook | Khaosod

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5 senior police officers demoted for allowing gambling operations - The Thaiger

TALLAHASSEE The political consultants who created the funding structure for the 2020 ghost candidate scandal are now in the midst of another election controversy over possibly thousands of faked signatures submitted by the campaign that is trying to bring a casino to Jacksonville.

Tallahassee-based political consultants Abigail MacIver, Dan Newman and Jeff Pitts, who run Canopy Partners, formed a subsidiary called Game Day Strategies with the goal of getting enough signatures to put a constitutional amendment on the 2022 November ballot, according to records released Tuesday by investigators for the Miami-Dade County State Attorneys office who are looking into the ghost candidate case.

MacIver and Newman worked with Tallahassee pollster and political consultant Ryan Tyson, and the effort was financed by casino giant Las Vegas Sands through a political committee named Florida Voters in Charge, documents show.

By Tuesdays deadline for verifying petitions, the casino amendment effort appears to have fallen short. The group had submitted only 814,212 qualified petitions by the 5 p.m. deadline, according to the Florida Division of Elections. That was 77,297 fewer than the 891,509 needed for the casino amendment to be placed on the November ballot.

The goal of the petition drive was to capitalize on an opportunity created by the Seminole Tribes agreement with the state, known as a gaming compact, that opened the door for tribe-controlled sports betting in Florida, as well as the possibility of a Las Vegas-style casino not operated by the Seminole Tribe to be built in North Florida if voters approved it through a constitutional amendment.

While the petition campaign may have failed, an investigation into the signature-gathering process has begun.

The Florida Department of Law Enforcement, at the urging of local state attorneys and the statewide prosecutor, has been working with investigators in several counties since January, said Gretl Plessinger, Florida Department of Law Enforcement spokesperson.

For two months, supervisors of elections across the state have complained that more than half of the signatures submitted by Florida Voters in Charge did not match with voter files, included names of dead people and that the suspect and hard-to-verify petitions were consuming their time and resources.

Secretary of State Laurel Lee in December urged Attorney General Ashley Moody to investigate.

No one has been charged with any wrongdoing, but supervisors and the committees opponents say they suspect that organizers for Florida Voters in Charge have paid petition gatherers by the signature, rather than by the hour. The Legislature made paying by the signature illegal in 2019, making violators guilty of a first-degree misdemeanor punishable by up to a year in jail. It also requires committees to submit every petition that is collected within 30 days after the elector signs the form or be liable for fees.

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Neither Tyson, MacIver, Pitts nor Newman responded to requests for comment. None have been charged with a crime.

Tyson and MacIver have been questioned by investigators for the Miami-Dade public corruption case, according to documents obtained by the Miami Herald.

What role the consultants MacIver, Newman, Pitts and Tyson played in the petition-gathering process for Sands casino initiative had been kept secret.

According to documents filed in Delaware, Game Day Strategies is a 501(c)(4) organization formed in June 2021. The nonprofit dark money organization is allowed by federal law to shield its donors and affiliations from disclosure.

But the political committee that hired them, Florida Voters in Charge, is required to disclose its contributions and expenditures. As of Dec. 31, Florida Voters in Charge had collected $50 million from Las Vegas Sands, and $45 million went to Game Day Strategies.

The casino company and its late owner, Sheldon Adelson, had long tried to bring a casino to Florida. His widow, Miriam Adelson, was ready to continue that quest. Within weeks of the legislative approval of the gambling compact last year, the consultants started lining up support and vendors for a petition drive and drafted an amendment that asked voters to authorize a casino at parimutuel facilities located 130 miles outside of the Seminole Tribes Florida facilities.

As of Dec. 31, Sands and supporters of Florida Voters in Charge had spent more than $51 million hiring petition gatherers to get the measure to the November 2022 ballot.

Sarah Bascom, spokesperson for Florida Voters in Charge, would not speak about the campaigns strategy and would not address questions related to Game Day Strategies.

The company does not have a deep public records trail in Florida, but information has emerged about its parent company, Canopy Partners.

MacIver and Pitts had previously worked with other political operatives, including former Tyson partner Alex Alvarado.

Alvarado is under investigation by the Miami-Dade County state attorney for his involvement with former state Sen. Frank Artiles, who is facing three third-degree felony charges related to campaign-finance violations in the ghost candidate scheme to siphon votes away from three state Senate Democratic candidates in the 2020 elections. Artiles has pleaded not guilty to the charges.

Documents obtained by the Orlando Sentinel show the role MacIver, Newman and Pitts played in a dark-money group that funded the advertising campaign for the ghost candidate scheme.

Tyson, a Republican political consultant and pollster, was a former vice president of political operations at Associated Industries of Florida., has conducted polling for Gov. Ron DeSantis and also worked closely with Florida Power & Light.

Tysons nonprofit has raised money from a number of large donors whose identities are not disclosed and made contributions to several politically active organizations, including Grow United the committee used by Canopy Partners to fund the ghost candidate advertising and other entities used by MacIver, Newman and Pitts, according to the documents.

Court documents obtained by the Miami Herald, as part of the Miami-Dade County investigation also show that Tysons nonprofit committee paid Artiles $125,000 for research, and paid Grow United $1.2 million.

Newman, a Democratic political consultant working with MacIver on Game Day Strategies, also previously worked for Sands lobbyist Nick Iarossi.

John Sowinski, an Orlando-based consultant who has worked on dozens of petition drives, said that while time was not on the side of Sands effort, it appears there was an attempt to overcome it by spending big on petition gatherers.

He said that traditionally vendors who hire petition gathering firms strive to have a 60-70 percent validity rate, but the casino petition was coming in with more than half of the petitions rejected, for various reasons.

Elections supervisors told the Times/Herald that there were batches of hundreds with just a small fraction acceptable.

We are rejecting about 60 percent to 62 percent of the casino petitions, said Wendy Link, supervisor of elections for Palm Beach County.

She said the county had to hire an enormous number of temporary staff at premium rates, to complete the verification of the petitions by the Tuesday deadline. By state law, any petitions received 30 days prior to the deadline must be validated by Feb. 1.

Because every fraudulent petition takes an estimated seven minutes to review, while the legitimate ones take a minute, it is costing her staff time and taxpayers money, Link said. This is killing our budget.

Meanwhile, Florida Voters in Charge filed an emergency motion in Leon County Circuit Court late Monday, asking the court to stop the secretary of state from certifying the information and declaring a new state law regulating petition gathering unlawful. Judge John C. Cooper held a hearing late Tuesday and denied the injunction.

The Sands-backed committee argues that elections officials have deemed more than 130,000 signatures invalid without offering the petition companies an opportunity to challenge the decisions or fix the signatures in question.

Bascom, the spokesperson for Florida Voters in Charge, said the 2019 changes in state law dramatically increased the cost to run the campaign and made it more difficult for political committees to validate the accuracy of their subcontractors.

She said the committee has gathered information and will gladly provide it to anyone investigating the signature gatherers and allegations of fraud.

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Consultants named in ghost candidate probe had role in gambling petition - Tampa Bay Times

More than 40 people affected by gambling, including recovering addicts and their families, are to take part in the 60-mile march, between Edinburgh and Glasgow, which will end at the national stadium, Hampden Park in Glasgow.

The event is being staged by The Big Step, an organisation set up by a former gambling addict which now wants to see the industrys involvement with football ended across the UK.

The online betting site Dafabet is the current Celtic shirt sponsor, while Old Firm rivals Rangers has the logo of the 32Red online casino firm on its shirts.

The marchers will visit both clubs when in Glasgow on February 13, before finishing their march at Hampden stadium.

The walk, which starts on February 11, will also see campaigners visit a number of other clubs, meet their representatives and also with some elected politicians.

Starting in Edinburgh, marchers will visit both Hibernian FC and city rivals Hearts, before heading on to other clubs including Livingston, Motherwell, and Hamilton Academical.

Kelly Field, one of those who will be taking part, said her online gambling addiction was fuelled by a relentless barrage of advertising.

She said: At my worst, I wasnt eating or drinking properly I felt suicidal at times and would gamble in the bathroom in secret.

Explaining why she was taking part in her first march, she added: Advertising and sponsorship, in football and elsewhere, makes people think that gambling is totally normal and safe, when the reality is very different.

Gambling kills and football must stop promoting it. I know of people who have taken their own life when they couldnt see any other way out.

James Grimes, who founded The Big Step after being addicted to gambling for 12 years, said the organisations latest event comes as we stand at a crucial moment.

The UK Government is reviewing the 2005 Gambling Act, with some rumours suggesting this could see betting firms banned from shirt sponsorship in the English Premier League.

But The Big Step wants ministers to go further than this and end the promotion of gambling across all levels of football within the UK.

Mr Grimes said: Decision-makers must put the health of young fans first and end all gambling ads in football.

If they dont, we encourage every club and governing body in Scotland including the ones we are visiting on this walk to be brave and to ban gambling sponsorship and advertising before the government makes the decision for them.

He added: We applaud Scottish footballs recent move away from gambling sponsorship of competitions, but much more must be done. This is a unique chance to be on the right side of history and we hope fans will help their club make this decision.

The UK Government received more than 16,000 responses to its call for evidence as part of the review of the Gambling Act, with a White Paper setting out the findings and proposals from this expected to be published in the coming months.

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Edinburgh to Glasgow march calls for end to gambling involvement in Scottish football - The Scotsman

Casino Guru began as a means to offer expert information for the online gaming community. The lack of a reliable source for verifying operators and industry players served as the foundation for the platform's launch. Casino Guru has expanded its scope to encompass more educational and responsible gambling initiatives. It's in the process of developing a global self-exclusion platform, which would be the first in the industry. Casino Guru was also an early adopter of a global complaints system for users. The latter gives anyone the ability to lodge an official complaint against a gaming platform, with Casino Guru's experts doing everything they can to help get the issue resolved fairly.

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Daniela Kianicovdaniela@casino.guru

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Casino Guru launches News website to expand coverage of the gambling industry - PR Newswire UK