Amendments to ban imitation gaming equipment pass second reading
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A bill banning bookmakers from using hardware and software resembling slot machines has passed its second reading. It was adopted along with government amendments: they extend the ban to programs that are only partially similar to slot machines, and also deregulate official sports games. Market participants note that the organizers of “quick games”, which involve betting on near-sporting events, enjoy the status of sporting events. Imitations of slot machines are mainly found in establishments that are already violating the law, experts say.
The State Duma adopted in the second reading amendments to the law on the regulation of gambling, which provide for a ban on bookmakers using programs or equipment resembling slot machines outside gambling zones. We are talking about programs and equipment that use symbols, images and drawings similar to those used in legal casino equipment. By the second reading, the government clarified that software and mechanisms that “fully or partially” copy the operation of slot machines fall under the ban (in the first edition, it was only about their imitation or complete copying).
Amendments to the law “On state regulation of the organization and conduct of gambling …” were introduced last year by the deputy from the “Fair Russia” Dmitry Gusev (see “Kommersant” dated July 7, 2022). They also provided for a ban on betting on events, the outcome of which depends on the actions of the organizer of gambling and its employees.
By the second reading, the draft was amended to ban gambling using software or equipment accessed via the Internet. Also, the authors of the amendments clearly removed from the proposed regulation of the games held by the organizers of sports competitions. Fonbet and Liga Stavov did not respond to Kommersant’s request, BetBoom and Pari declined to comment.
The amendments in their current form do not affect the segment of “quick games” (high-frequency bets on near-sporting events that involve a random outcome without analysis), says Nikolay Oganezov, president of the First SRO of bookmakers: “Such “competitions” are held within federations and leagues. Formally, they are sports, but in fact they are a marketing product specifically for bookmakers.” He believes that games of this kind need to be dealt with in other ways – for example, through the Ministry of Sports, which may not give such competitions an official sports status: “Otherwise, classic sports will start receiving less targeted deductions than their variants among” fast games “”.
The bill is aimed more at combating illegal gambling establishments than at complicating the work of bookmakers, Dmitry Anfinogenov, executive director of the Association of Entertainment and Gambling Operators of Russia, believes: “Legal bookmakers do not use programs that are stylistically similar to slot machines.” He assured that the association supports the whitewashing of the market, as this can contribute to the growth of attendance of gambling zones: “At the same time, the audiences of legal and illegal casinos overlap only partially – the latter are mainly used by residents of large cities who are not ready to travel.”
Anton Eshtokin, Marketing Director of Bookmaker Rating, confirms that the amendments will have a minimal impact on the legal sector of bookmakers, and the illegal sector “by definition works outside the law.” As for the “quick games”, then, according to him, the bookmakers with a Russian license have a small turnover of bets on them.
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