People who gamble with unlicensed operators in Great Britain largely continue to bet with licensed sites as well, according to a Gambling Commission analysis of bank transaction data that the regulator describes as a proof of concept for measuring the black market.

The study, Illegal gambling: Findings from an open banking data analysis, was published on 28 October. It links anonymised open banking transactions from a consenting panel of British residents to survey answers, allowing the Commission to observe behaviour directly rather than rely on self-reported estimates.

Supplement, not substitute

The Commission found no substantial shift away from licensed gambling in the months after a person was first detected paying an illegal operator. Trade press summaries of the full report put the share of people with repeated detected illegal payments who also gambled with licensed operators at 91%.

Those summaries also describe the underlying dataset as a YouGov open banking panel of around 38,000 people covering July 2018 to July 2026, in which 3,426 transactions linked to known or suspected illegal operators were identified across 179 individuals.

Harm indicators were markedly higher among illegal-market users. Some 45% of people with a detected illegal transaction scored 8 or more on the Problem Gambling Severity Index, the threshold for problem gambling, compared with 6% of licensed gambling consumers in the dataset, excluding lottery-only players. The Commission also found that 4% of detected transactions with unlicensed operators were made by credit card, a payment method banned for gambling with licensed British operators, and that 8% of people with detected illegal activity had made at least one such credit card payment.

“This has the benefit of enabling direct observation of consumer behaviour in the illegal market,” Steven Murphy, a postdoctoral data scientist at the Commission, wrote in a blog accompanying the release.

Clear limits

The regulator was explicit about what the data cannot show. The panel is not nationally representative, some payments to unlicensed sites are likely to go undetected and cryptocurrency transactions are not captured. The Commission said it does not have enough coverage to estimate the size of the illegal market, in absolute terms or relative to licensed gambling, and that the design does not allow conclusions about whether illegal gambling causes harm.

Separate Consumer Voice research published by the Commission on 20 October identified searches for sites “not on GamStop” as a main route into the illegal market. That search behaviour has also drawn regulatory attention elsewhere, with the advertising watchdog last week upholding a complaint over a search ad targeting self-excluded gamblers.

Tax debate

The findings land in the middle of an argument over whether higher duties are pushing customers offshore. The Betting and Gaming Council has repeatedly warned that tax rises on the regulated sector will make illegal sites more attractive, a case it pressed again after the Budget brought Category B machines into the 25% machine games duty rate.

The BGC has also cited a forecast from H2 Gambling Capital that, by 2031, more than one in five pounds staked online in Britain could be placed with illegal operators. The Commission’s study does not attempt a comparable estimate, and the regulator has warned that its current coverage is not sufficient to produce one.

The Commission’s data does not settle that question, but it suggests that, for now, most people using illegal sites have not abandoned the licensed market. That gives the regulator and operators a population that remains reachable through licensed-sector safer gambling tools, even as the Commission works on better ways to size the black market itself.

Sporttrade has been registered by the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission as both a designated contract market (DCM) and a derivatives clearing organisation (DCO), giving the former state-licensed betting exchange a federal route to offer sports event contracts nationwide.

The Philadelphia-based company announced the approvals in a statement released on 2 November. It said the exchange and clearing functions would be rolled out in phases, starting with selected flow and liquidity providers, with a pipeline of brokers and institutional partners to follow in the coming months.

Broker-led model

Sporttrade is positioning itself as market infrastructure rather than a consumer brand. As a DCM it can support intermediated trading through futures commission merchants, as well as direct-access participants, introducing brokers and independent software vendors. Its DCO registration allows it to clear and settle trades for self-clearing members and intermediaries on a fully collateralised basis, and to clear for other DCMs. The company said it is in clearing discussions with several exchanges.

The dual registration matters because it lets Sporttrade operate both the trading venue and the clearing house behind it. Many newer prediction market entrants have instead had to partner with an existing exchange or clearing member, which adds cost and limits control over product design and settlement.

Fliff, the social sportsbook, is among the brokers being onboarded and will route customer order flow to the exchange, pending regulatory approval.

“Receiving our DCM and DCO registrations from the CFTC is a true full circle moment for our company,” said chief executive Alexander Kane.

From state licences to federal oversight

The approvals complete a pivot that Sporttrade began earlier this year. The company filed its DCM and DCO applications in February and, while awaiting a decision, wound down its betting exchange in the five US states where it held sports wagering licences, with operations ending by 26 June, according to contemporaneous reports.

The decision arrives at a busy moment for the CFTC’s prediction markets agenda. The regulator has moved to define event contracts as swaps while carving out traditional sportsbooks, and last month it ordered Novig and ProphetX not to list self-certified sports contracts. Sporttrade is one of a number of applicants that have sought their own exchange and clearing registrations in the past year.

The roughly nine months between filing and approval is in line with the faster review times the CFTC has shown for event-contract venues this year, as the agency under its current leadership has taken a more permissive view of sports contracts than state regulators.

Why it matters

Sporttrade’s licence gives sportsbook-style brands another option for accessing federally regulated sports contracts without building their own exchange. Several US operators have launched prediction products through tie-ups with existing DCMs, and a clearing-capable venue that markets itself to brokers adds competition on spreads and execution, which Sporttrade has made the centrepiece of its pitch.

The approval does not settle the wider fight between federally regulated event-contract venues and state gaming regulators, several of which continue to argue that sports contracts are wagers subject to state law. How quickly Sporttrade can move from its initial liquidity providers to a broad broker network will indicate how much appetite there is for another sports exchange in an increasingly crowded field.

Sweden’s gambling regulator Spelinspektionen has issued an immediate ban against Immortal Snail LLC, the company behind the offshore casino brand duel.com, after finding that the operator continued to target Swedish players without a licence.

The operator holds a licence from Anjouan, one of the autonomous islands of the Comoros, and has no local licence in Sweden or in the other markets where it is active, according to reports by SBC News and iGaming Expert. Industry coverage describes the company as based in Saint Kitts and Nevis.

No IP blocking, Swedish still on offer

Spelinspektionen’s investigation found that IP blocking against Sweden had not been implemented. Players logging in from a Swedish IP address could still select Swedish kronor and the Swedish language, and Swedish-language marketing for the brand was continuing.

The regulator issued the order as an immediate ban under the Swedish Gambling Act, which requires anyone offering gambling to Swedish consumers to hold a local licence.

The operator’s response has drawn attention across the trade press. According to SBC News, the company argued that Swedish is an international language, that it cannot control whether payments are made in kronor, and that it would not stop offering Swedish. It suggested that Sweden itself should be IP-blocked rather than the operator restricting access.

That stance is unusual. Offshore operators named in Swedish ban orders typically say little publicly and quietly restrict access, if they respond at all. An operator openly disputing the regulator’s authority over its Swedish-language offer is a more direct challenge, and one that tests how far a national regulator can go against a company with no assets or staff in its jurisdiction.

Anjouan licences under pressure

The case adds to scrutiny of the Anjouan licensing regime. Last month the Comoros government branded Anjouan gambling licences illegal and asked the UK for help in dealing with them, a move that undercuts the regulatory cover such licences have provided to operators serving grey and black markets.

Duel.com’s founder, Ossi Ketola, previously ran CSGOEmpire, which Spelinspektionen barred from targeting Sweden in November 2023, according to iGaming Expert. The brand’s marketing has also been criticised in industry coverage for its use of adult content creators and provocative influencer campaigns aimed at younger audiences.

Limits of national enforcement

The ban is part of a steady stream of enforcement actions by Spelinspektionen against unlicensed sites, alongside action against licensees such as its decision to revoke Charm Entertainment’s casino licence earlier in October. But the regulator’s tools against an offshore company that openly refuses to comply are limited. A ban order allows Spelinspektionen to pursue payment blocking and to refer breaches for criminal investigation, but the operator has signalled it does not intend to change course.

Sweden’s own licensed market has been under pressure from tighter rules, including bonus restrictions and deposit limits, which licensed operators say have made it harder to compete with unlicensed sites offering larger promotions and fewer checks.

Swedish licensees and their trade body BOS have long argued that channelisation into the licensed market is being eroded by offshore brands that face few practical consequences. Commentators, including SCCG, have said the Duel.com case shows regulators need stronger cross-border coordination and more pressure on advertising platforms to remove such operators’ marketing.

How Spelinspektionen follows up, including whether it moves against payment flows or seeks a criminal referral, will be watched closely by licensed operators in a market where the industry is already pressing the regulator to rethink its priorities.