Licensing Expert

Consolidation within the betting industry, propelled by tougher regulatory requirements and higher rates of tax, has been hitting the headlines in recent months, with Ladbrokes and Coral, Betfair and Paddy Power, Bwin.party and 888/GVC leading the charge. Taking the first of those as an example, a combination of Ladbrokes 2,209 betting shops at the end of 2014 and Coral’s 1,834 …

Gambling industry legal expert David Clifton (Clifton Davies Consultancy), examines the GBGA’s tax and competition based challenge against the UK POC regime, as the case reaches the higher courts of European Union Law.    The Gibraltar Betting and Gaming Association (GBGA) has been celebrating what must by any account be regarded as an intermediate victory in its judicial challenge to the …

Gambling  industry legal expert David Clifton, examines the fast growing US daily fantasy sports market, and considers whether Europe’s diverse regulatory conditions will allow for fantasy sports to gain  traction and new market entry Fantasy sports have exploded in a big way in the US. My inbox seems saturated with emails informing me that this is the fastest growing segment …

The principle of self-exclusion is not new. If a person wants to refrain from gambling they can ask a gambling operator – whether land-based or online – to refuse to accept their custom. Before a customer completes a self-exclusion agreement, the significance and implications of their action should be explained to them, including the minimum exclusion duration of six months …

Licensing expert David Clifton, of consultants Clifton Davies, has analysed what the political parties have to say about the betting shop’s main breadwinner and doesn’t like what he sees. Fixed Odds Betting Terminals have rarely been out of the news since they were first introduced into Britain’s betting shops. That is now thirteen years ago. Just a year after that, …

In his Budget announcement on 18 March 2015, the Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne announced the Government’s intention to replace the Horserace Betting Levy with a new Horserace Betting Right administered directly by the racing industry that will apply to all bookmakers wherever they are located. This has been a long-running saga. In 2000, the then Government stated its …

Readers will recall that greater protection for British consumers was the prime reason the Government introduced last year’s new legislation requiring all overseas online gambling operators wishing to transact with, or advertise to, British customers to obtain an operating licence from the Gambling Commission. In addition, by 31 March 2015, operators licensed in Great Britain must source their gambling software …

David Clifton, director at licensing and gambling consultancy Clifton Davies, discusses an issue he recently debated at a seminar in Westminster – that the  government is not consistent when it regulates gambling and that it is also needlessly overbearing. Let me start with a statement of the obvious: the fundamental objective behind the regulation or prohibition of any human activity …

David Clifton MD of CliftonDavies opens the Betting on Football (BOF) Conference by telling the BOF audience that change is imminent for UK operators, and that the legal and regulatory landscape for gambling operators will change drastically in the next months. Clifton states that legislation will be implemented by August 2014, currently the new amendments to the Gambling Bill are …