Jo Blitz

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“We feel that people are always interested in gambling and that we are the party who should offer that in a safe way. [Holland Casino] has been careful to maintain that, but of course our costs rose very quickly, so we restructured at our head office. We have also been looking at innovations in offerings, which we are currently also testing, including a further development of the Next Zone. We’ve also introduced the double zero in roulette, which we didn’t have previously in the Netherlands,” the CEO says.

“Obviously, in the gaming industry we don’t have a price tag on our product where you can just change the RTP (return-to-player) and your problem is solved, it doesn’t work like that. Especially not if you take responsible gaming seriously.”

Speaking of which, in Holland the casinos must have two databases, one for online players, one for land-based, and keep them very separate – except for when it comes to responsible gambling (RG). A casino can’t use its online offering to promote the land-based side to players, and vice-versa – but the data can all be used together to make sure customers are safe from harm whenever they play with the same operator, online or otherwise.

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IPI now has until this Friday to find a new lawyer to carry the six-case workload Hasselback had, but will most likely use this as an excuse to delay the ongoing legal battles. It won’t get very far with that, though, and perhaps Judge Kennedy expected IPI to try something. She added in her ruling that the attorney’s exit “may cause some delay, [but] that delay is not so much so that it would cause significant prejudice or adversely and materially affect the plaintiff.”

This particular lawsuit involving Fox Financial, one of a growing list IPI is battling, centers on an arrangement the company made with a third party, Forson Holdings. That entity had leased property from Fox in 2016, but fell behind. IPI had signed as a guarantor of that lease agreement and, as such, was responsible for covering Forson in the event payments weren’t made. However, it decided it didn’t need to follow the terms of the contract.

It seems like not a day goes by without IPI coming under fire for something else. The company’s chairwoman, Cui Li Jie, has already found herself in trouble and was previously held in contempt of court, but now has another black mark beside her name. She has been found in contempt again, this time for allegedly perjuring herself in court. A lawyer representing employees suing IPI and Cui produced evidence proving she had lied under oath, and Chief Judge Ramona V. Manglona has now agreed. She issued her ruling this morning, with Cui only able to respond, through an interpreter, “I don’t know anything, I don’t understand English.”

About Jo Blitz

The $10 trillion forecast also implies significant growth in just five years from what previously stood as some of the most optimistic 2030 projections. In April, Bernstein estimated prediction market volume will ascend to $1 trillion by 2030 while Bank of America said prediction markets will eventually grow to $1.1 trillion in yearly turnover. A July report from Macquarie analyst Chad Beynon included a $1.5 trillion annual volume forecast by 2030.

If Bernstein’s $10 trillion prediction market turnover forecast is realized or exceeded, it’d likely prove significant in revenue terms because the research firm previously estimated that $1 trillion in yearly activity could generate as much as $10.8 billion in revenue for operators.

As has been widely documented, sports event contracts are currently the lifeblood of the prediction market industry, but Bernstein notes that won’t be the case on a permanent basis. In fact, the research firm estimates that sports derivatives’ share of industry volume will decline to 35% in 2035, indicating that the aforementioned volume increase will be led by other categories.