THE AMERICAS
CG Technology’s underpaying scandal forced the resignation of its CEO; Valve Corp ordered 23 eSports skin-betting operators to stop using its Steam marketplace; a Chinese consortium that includes Giant Interactive Group emerged as the frontrunner to buy Caesars Interactive’s social gaming operations; online gambling was the fastest growing segment of the British Columbia Lottery Corp’s annual report; tribal casinos posted their biggest revenue gain in a decade while Pennsylvania’s casinos set a new revenue record; the developers of the Bait app found a way to marry sports betting with Uber-style ratings; Larry Flynt won his casino tax fight with Gardena city council; Nevada casinos prepped for the return of Olympic betting; Ainsworth’s Bernie Gamboa explained why Latin America really gets him hot and Betgenius’ Peo Lekare explained the role culture plays in Latin America’s sports betting market; Rafi Farber offered a mid-year review of gambling stock performance; the World Series of Poker 2016 identified its November Nine and Jason Mercier was named WSOP 2016 Player of the Year.
EUROPE
William Hill pushed CEO James Henderson out the door following the company’s online hiccups; Poland gave its state-owned lottery a monopoly on online casino operations; Amaya Gaming trimmed “dozens” of staff at its London office; Bet365 and PokerStars topped Italy’s online betting and poker charts; Betsson’s Q2 numbers lived down to their advance billing; Greek police broke up a Taiwanese-led online betting ring; eSports Integrity Coalition’s Ian Smith discussed the nine threats keeping him up at night and BD Sport Europe’s Tom Van Beem explained why Dutch gamblers are nonplussed by their country’s online gambling legislative progress.
ASIA and AUSTRALIA
Comments by Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte put CEZA-licensed online gambling operators on edge; Macau casinos saw VIP gaming revenue tumble in Q2; China’s leading search engine Baidu got caught running illegal online gambling advertising; Interpol trumpeted its success in combating Euro 2016 betting in Asian countries; more than half of China’s blue collar workers copped to playing the lottery; Macau ordered its first ever closure of a five-star hotel; Aussie TV execs pushed back against proposals to curb betting adverts; Sportsbet topped Aussie betting brand recognition surveys; India’s Supreme Court suggested legislators should legalize sports betting already; Manila Bay Resorts changed its name to Okada Manila; PAGCOR reported a rise in H1 profits and confirmed plans to reopen the Army Navy Club casino before year’s end but public officials won’t be welcome; Berjaya Corp launched lottery operations in Vietnam; Savan Vegas’ former owners continued their fight against the Laotian government and the Korean Baseball Organization was rocked by not one but two new gambling scandals.
