United Kingdom: all our coverage

The newspaper's first reporting from the Curaçao regulator's files turns a licensing scandal into a question about who serves British players without a licence, and puts new documents behind its earlier reporting on the Santeda casino network. Its reporter also says the offshore trade is already moving on, to Anjouan and other lighter-touch licensors.

The Betting and Gaming Council has launched a campaign built on shop workers' stories and a poll of Andy Burnham's Makerfield seat, a month before a Budget that may double Machine Games Duty. Its job figures are its own; the think tank behind the proposal says the rise would raise up to £458 million.

A flat 5% tax and a device levy give way to rates by game type, but only on play by people in Malta. The bigger change for the island's exporters is VAT: most remote gaming loses its exemption, which lets operators recover input tax.

Genting, which runs 32 casinos in the UK, puts the cost of a 40% Machine Games Duty at about £16 million a year and more than 850 venue jobs. It is the casino sector's answer to the harm case against machines, a month before the Budget on 28 October.

Replying to Fred Done's forecast of 495 Betfred closures, Kenny told the Financial Times he used "the same script" himself when he represented bookmakers. He wants machines and online slots taxed harder than bets on sport.

Long-term unemployed Universal Credit claimants would receive a cut-rate allowance on a prepaid card that cannot be used for betting, alcohol, cigarettes or cash withdrawals. The opposition's plan puts betting on the same list as tobacco and alcohol.

The government wants to stop licensed operators taking bets on Powerball draws now that the US game is sold as a National Lottery product. It is the EuroMillions ban of 2018 again, and the consultation runs until 4 November.

Tim Miller, a senior figure at the Gambling Commission for about a decade, has set up an advisory firm aimed at governments and regulators rather than operators, starting in North America. He says it will not be "just another compliance consultancy", and has already said what he thinks does not work: blanket prohibitions and ever-higher taxes.

The Conservative leader told The Sun that Labour is in a "tax doom loop" and that the operators who follow the rules will be the ones to close. Her intervention lands five weeks before a Budget in which the Treasury is reported to be modelling a doubling of Machine Games Duty, and as the Betting and Gaming Council puts the cost at up to 16,000 jobs.

Greater Manchester Police, supported by the Gambling Commission and the city council's licensing team, executed four simultaneous warrants in Manchester city centre on Monday night. Gambling tables, records and account books were seized, and one man was arrested on suspicion of money laundering and Gambling Act offences.

A CBS News investigation into how sportsbooks keep bettors engaged featured a Virginia customer who likened gambling to "crack in the '80s". FanDuel suspended his account after the broadcast, a step CBS said the company told him about only after he appeared in its story. The operator says it acts whenever a customer raises concerns, on television or anywhere else.

The Gambling Commission has suspended the remote licence of Targetlocal Ltd, the Swansea company behind kenhowells.com, after enquiries it says revealed anti-money laundering failings. It is the third British online bookmaker suspended pending a licence review in less than a month.

The title sponsor of Super League, the Challenge Cup and England Rugby League will walk away at the end of the 2026 season. Fred Done ties the decision to last year's budget and the 132 shop closures that followed, and says the five Classics could go the same way if machine gaming duty rises in October.

Greater Manchester Police worked the raids with the Gambling Commission and the city council's licensing team, on intelligence gathered after a similar operation in May. Two women were held on suspicion of immigration offences, one over money laundering and the Gambling Act, and one over licensing.

Vicky Foxcroft makes her first public appearance in the role at a Labour conference fringe titled "What Next for Gambling Reform: Time for a New Act?" Nobody on the panel has publicly opposed new primary legislation, and neither the industry nor punters are represented.

The Curaçao Gaming Authority says the access has been contained and its source identified, and that it has found no compromise of core infrastructure, but it has not yet established what information was reached. The portal is the single channel for every licence application, supplier filing and incident report under the LOK.

A consumer-advocate report collects what is publicly known about the national self-exclusion register: awareness at a quarter of adults and a third of bettors, fifteen operators caught breaching it, one of them more than 100,000 times, three financial penalties, and an Entain case the regulator investigated past its own 12-month limit.

The regulator has reminded operators that they must screen customers against asset-freezing measures, block designated individuals from opening accounts or betting, freeze funds immediately and report to the Minister for the Economy. The case behind the warning brought a €20,000 fine, a suspended two-month operating ban, and personal penalties for two executives.

The exchange has been meeting regulators in the UK and the EU to argue that its contracts belong to financial supervisors rather than gambling ones, the Financial Times reports, after being blocked in Italy, the Netherlands and France. Britain's Gambling Commission says a prediction market launching here could not classify itself as non-gambling.

The Betfred founder has put numbers on the Treasury's option: 45% of his estate, 2,475 jobs, £66.8m of tax and £15.8m of racing funding, in a Sunday Times op-ed and a Financial Times interview in which he says machines are half of shop profit. Betfred has already ended its Super League sponsorship, citing last year's Budget.

A 2023 model ranked online casino players by how much they would lose per promotion and steered bonuses towards the top scorers, according to the New York Times. A parallel model to flag customers sliding towards harm was shut down in early 2025. DraftKings says predictive risk scoring was not evidence-based.

The MGA and the Malta Digital Innovation Authority launched a principles-based framework on Thursday for operators using AI in player protection, fraud detection and customer contact. It sits under the EU AI Act, binds nobody, and is a rare instance of a gambling regulator writing down what it expects of a licensee's models. Charles Mizzi: "Our role is not to stand in the way of innovation."

Stella David wants the government's promised ban brought in immediately, "even if that means clubs ordering new kit mid-season", and extended to online advertising, where 22% of unlicensed users first found their operator against 13% through sponsorship. The count is up from eight clubs last season, and the newest deal was signed after the consultation closed.

The state court that granted Spribe an injunction against NSX in April, then revoked it in July when a federal court suspended the developer's trademark, has now ruled on the merits: no trademark infringement, no copyright infringement, no unfair competition. It is the third Brazilian decision in a row to go against the Estonian studio, three days after a Brasília judge ordered it to police its own distribution.