Legalizing -- South Africa's Department of Trade and Industry has submitted to the cabinet for approval a draft amendment bill to allow for the licensing of online casinos in the country. The bill is based on a National Gambling Board report identifying a need to license and regulate online gambling in South Africa. Brian Muthwa, director of legislative drafting for the department, said the bill will be available for public comment by the end of October, and he his hopeful it will pass by the end of the first quarter of 2007. Astrid Ludin, the deputy director general for the department's consumer and corporate regulation division, said the government will outlaw online gambling until the bill was passed. "We do not believe outlawing will stop (interactive) gambling," Ludin said. "Therefore, it is better to regulate it."
Illegalizing -- Looking to quash Internet gambling, the Ontario government on Thursday introduced a bill to ban gambling Web sites from advertising in the province. Increased Internet gambling addiction among teens is the main driver behind the legislation, whose backers point to a recent survey by the Responsible Gambling Council showing that addiction levels among people aged 18 to 24 rose 400 percent between 2001 and 2005. Gerry Phillips, minister of government services, will attach a bill of amendments to Ontario's Consumer Protection Act, including a section aimed at banning media organizations from running ads by gambling Web sites. The legislation will only target the play-for-money services. Web sites that take money bets from Canadians are illegal under the Criminal Code because the provinces have exclusive authority over all forms of gambling.
Shrinking -- PartyGaming revealed today that turning away U.S. players will cost the company $250 million and that revenues from its non-U.S. operations have fallen. The company announced its withdrawal from the U.S. market--three-quarters of its customer base--after the passage of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act in September. The company said today that since it stopped taking U.S. bets on Oct. 13, average daily revenue from its non-U.S. operations had fallen 2 percent. It also said that it is too early to comment on the future impact. The company is now focusing on building up its European business and plans to open multilingual pokers sites.
No-Go Zone -- Online sports book Sportingbet has barred its executives from traveling to France, where the directors of Austria-based bwin were arrested in September. Bwin co-CEOs Manfred Bodner and Norbert Teufelberger were detained by French authorities on Sept. 15 for alleged violation of domestic betting laws. Andy McIver, Sportingbet's new chief executive, said the move was merely precautionary, as the company does not advertise in France. "Our understanding is that we don't have an issue in France," he said. "But following the bwin arrests, we decided that as a board we wouldn't travel to France because we felt we were in enough hot water with the Peter Dicks situation in the U.S."
Mystery Date -- Rumors are circulating that Australian online sports book Betcorp's U.S. sports betting operation WWTS has been snapped up by a well known Costa Rican company for US$9 million. Australian media are reporting that the mystery buyer is Bodog, which has said it does not plan to comply with the U.S. online gambling ban. "We've structured our business in such a way that we'll have no problems adapting to any changes in the online gaming environment," said Bodog.com founder Calvin Ayre. "We see the future as very positive for Bodog.com." Betcorp officials have not confirmed the sale.
ISCG Site -- The Institute for the Study of Commercial Gaming (ISCG) at the University of Macau recently launched a Web site featuring more than 40 articles on gaming/gambling in Asian context (Macau in particular) that are written by professors at the institute/university. ISCG is a not-for-profit gaming research and development center whose mission is to bridge the gap between the theories and practices of gaming in Macau and across Asia.