Betfair closes to Russian players

Received this notification today from Betfair.

“Due to recent developments within the Russian market, we regret to inform you that on all our products across all platforms we will no longer be able to accept players located in Russia from Friday 11th of April”

Have any laws or regulations related to Internet gambling changed in Russia recently?

Don’t think so. Mr Putin is probably more focused on Ukraine than online gambling right now.

I suspect Betfair’s decision to knock back players from Russia has more to do with the UK Gambling Commission’s recently released guidance on its new Gambling (Licensing and Advertising) Bill, expected to take effect later this year (see discussion on UK’s proposed new iGaming laws for more).

Basically, the new laws will require all overseas based operators wanting to participate in the UK online gambling to get a licence to do so from the Gambling Commission, regardless of what other licenses they already have. So Betfair (Malta license), William Hill (Gibraltar license) and all their neighbours will have to get a UK license if they want to be able to continue hosting UK players (as well as paying additional tax on UK punter revenues).

Back to the guidance (full details here). In assessing the integrity of licence applicants, one of the things the Commission will look at is,

“…the manner by which the applicant has conducted any previous business with specific regard to the provision of gambling in other jurisdictions and in particular any operations in black or grey markets” (13.4)

Perhaps these are the developments the team at Betfair are referring to?

May also be the reason behind William Hill’s decision to turn it’s back on most of the third world.