iGaming News

With a full estate sale off the table and cost pressures mounting, Entain is cutting deep in Ireland. The retail betting shop is becoming an endangered species on both sides of the Irish Sea.

Following a transformative year for the Brazilian iGaming industry, Alea is returning to São Paulo for its second consecutive term as the Headline Partner for NEXT.io Focus Brazil.

The UK's Remote Gaming Duty has doubled overnight. Industry insiders are warning of a spiral effect that could permanently reshape Britain's licensed gambling market, and nobody, including the Treasury, knows where it ends.

Evoke warned this would happen if the government pressed ahead with its tax plans. It pressed ahead. Now 200 William Hill shops are closing and thousands of jobs are at risk.

A €1.2 billion market growing at 15% year-on-year and still less than 60% online. Superbet has spotted the opportunity, and it is moving fast.

Norway is investing heavily in education, treatment and research to tackle gambling harm from the ground up. But with its state monopoly operator under scrutiny, the government faces questions about whether prevention alone is enough.

As martial law continues, Ukraine is deploying automated technology to shield its military from online gambling, in what represents one of the most targeted regulatory interventions in the industry.

One of Europe and Latin America's most recognisable gambling operators is on the block. With advisors hired and a summer deadline in sight, the race to acquire Codere is already taking shape.

Germany's gambling regulator claims 77% of players are in the licensed market. The industry says the real figure is closer to 50%, and the consequences of getting it wrong could reshape the country's entire regulatory future.

The Malta Gaming Authority is investigating unauthorised access to one of its systems after German security researcher Lilith Wittmann claimed responsibility, accused the regulator of enabling organised crime, and threatened to release a wider archive of gambling related data if enforcement action is pursued.

Earlier this year, Casino Guru officially revealed the shortlists across all award categories, following a record-breaking number of high-quality applications from across the iGaming industry. These shortlisted candidates represent the strongest performers in areas such as transparency, social responsibility, innovation, leadership, and player protection.

New figures from GamCare and debt advice provider PayPlan show that 1,954 people sought financial guidance through GamCare's Money Guidance Service in 2025, more than double the previous year, with total reported debt rising 153% to £7.2 million, and January 2026 recording the highest monthly referral total in the service's history.

Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes has filed 20 criminal misdemeanour charges against prediction market platform Kalshi, alleging it operated an unlicensed gambling business and accepted bets on state elections in violation of Arizona law, marking the first criminal prosecution of a prediction market company by any US state.

Meta has removed more than 159 million fraudulent ads and shut down 10.9 million scam-linked accounts in 2025, while a joint international operation with the Royal Thai Police, FBI, and US Department of Justice disabled 150,000 accounts tied to Southeast Asian scam centres and led to 21 arrests, as criminal networks increasingly use fake gambling platforms to lure victims.

Indiana Governor Mike Braun has signed House Bill 1052 into law, making Indiana the first state in 2026 and the seventh overall to prohibit dual-currency sweepstakes casino platforms, with civil penalties of up to $100,000 per violation taking effect from 1 July 2026.

The US Commodity Futures Trading Commission has issued binding staff guidance and opened a formal advance rulemaking process on prediction markets, signalling a decisive shift under Chairman Mike Selig as event contracts surge from five per year in 2006 to roughly 1,600 certified contracts in 2025.

Austrian prosecutors have filed criminal bribery charges against Novomatic founder Johann Graf and former Ainsworth CEO Harald Neumann, adding fresh regulatory scrutiny to a company already locked out of its AU$1-per-share takeover of Australian gaming supplier Ainsworth Game Technology after minority shareholders blocked the deal in February 2026.

Finland's state-owned operator Veikkaus has signalled ambitions to become a respected international gaming group by 2030, as its full-year 2025 results reveal declining domestic revenues and its B2B arm Fennica Gaming posts near-doubled turnover across 17 global markets all ahead of Finland's licensed market launch in July 2027.

The Kansspelautoriteit has handed Novatech a record €24.8m fine for operating Qbet.com and 55Bet.com illegally in the Netherlands, as the Dutch regulator signals it will pursue the entire ecosystem behind unlicensed gambling - including influencers, payment providers, and hosting companies.

Dutch operators have urged lawmakers to revisit the Netherlands’ rising gambling tax, claiming the policy has reduced receipts by an estimated €43.5m in 2025 and is accelerating movement to unlicensed sites ahead of a parliamentary committee debate on 11 March.

The milestone further strengthens the CRC’s position as one of the industry’s most trusted dispute resolution platforms, providing free and impartial assistance to players across the globe.

Freedom of Information documents suggest DCMS warned the UK Treasury that large gambling duty increases could miss revenue targets and boost illegal play through behavioural change, but Treasury pressed ahead as the Finance Bill enters a key parliamentary stage.

Bally’s Intralot will transition its lotteries leadership on 16 March 2026 as Nikos Nikolakopoulos steps down as President of Lotteries, with chief operating officer Chrysostomos Sfatos set to assume the role while the outgoing executive remains on the board as a non-executive director.

Israeli police are investigating a large Polymarket wager that correctly predicted a United States strike on Iran on 28 February, amid concerns about possible insider knowledge and renewed scrutiny of how prediction platforms handle high risk geopolitical markets.