THE AMERICAS
New Jersey’s online gambling revenue rose one-fifth in 2015; daily fantasy sports operators won a permanent stay of their New York court injunction; DFS got its first high-profile casualty as FantasyUp went belly-up; Vermont’s Attorney General’s office became the latest to label DFS as illegal gambling; three winners split the record $1.6b Powerball jackpot; WSEX co-founder Haden Ware pled guilty in a Manhattan court; Atlantic City’s casino revenue fell for the ninth straight year and New Jersey pols settled on a North Jersey casino bill; Pennsylvania set a new casino revenue record in 2015; virtual reality was tipped as the future of eSports; WEBE Gaming prez John English said the Nevada sports betting landscape was becoming “very outgoing” and Antonio Esfandiari got disqualified from the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure for peeing at the table but was on his best behavior when he joined Tatjana Pasalic in this week’s episode of Chats with Tats.
EUROPE
William Hill’s executive shuffling continued after its 2015 revenue slipped; Bet365 lost its bid to lift the suspension of its Romanian license; PokerStars resolved its Italian back tax problems, and dropped four more Team Pros while BetStars launched its new Spin & Bet feature; Italian police broke up an illegal online gambling ring linked to DollaroBet; Europol arrested two key figures of the DD4BC online gambling extortion ring; UK racing rejected Gala Coral’s compromise to the new authorized betting partner scheme; NetPlay TV broke off talks to acquire Sportech’s Football Pools; GVC Holdings’ casino outpaced its sportsbook in 2015; Mondogoal made its DFS debut in Italy; Rafi Farber handicapped NetEnt’s journey into uncharted waters; The Sun’s head of marketing Emma Loveday preached the importance of brand advocacy; SafeCharge COO Yuval Ziv explained why the payments industry is in for a bumpy ride; Match Poker’s Patrick Nally touted the benefits of sportifying poker and Casumo CMO Hanne Aimonen explained why online casino customers change sites every three months.
ASIA
Lottoland launched its Australian lottery betting site which promptly crashed as jackpot-mad Aussie tried to buy Powerball tickets; a new risk report identified Macau as a tempting terrorist target; Macau’s new gaming boss refused to renew 35 junket operator licenses and Macau’s number of VIP gaming rooms shrunk to 100 while adding its first junket-run VIP slot room; Wynn Resorts said its 2015 Macau revenue would be downright fugly; Taiwan busted two more election betting rings; the Philippine gaming industry grew in 2015 despite industry headwinds; the Cambodian government’s casino tax revenue rose one-third in 2015; Chinese police put cyberbrime mugshots on a deck of cards; the pimping trial of Stanley Ho’s nephew Alan got underway; six Macau police officers were accused of helping mainland gamblers skirt customs and Sam Trickett signed on as brand ambassador of Indian poker site Starpoker.in.
