SBC partnered with some of the brightest minds in gaming to host a webinar discussing the complex regulatory landscape of the U.S. commercial gaming market.
The discussion, moderated by SBC Americas News Editor Tom Nightingale, included a panel of industry experts. The presenters included Great Canadian Entertainment General Counsel & Chief Administrative Officer Katie Lever and PrizePicks Director of Gaming Regulatory Compliance Todd Grossman.
In this webinar, the panelists discussed how operators and key stakeholders in gaming are handling emerging verticals, regulatory trends and the challenges of adhering to compliance standards. The group also discussed how stakeholders develop and implement compliance strategies in markets across the U.S. and Canada.
‘Knowledge is power’ when navigating regulations
The influx of emerging gaming verticals following the overturning of PASPA in 2018 has caused businesses and regulators in gaming to change their approaches to compliance.
A U.S. gaming market that was once dominated by retail casino gaming, with regulated sports wagering in only Nevada, has now exploded nationwide amid the proliferation of emerging verticals, including online sweepstakes casinos and prediction markets.
“Now, we see regulators truly shaping the market,” said Lever. “Their enforcement actions are signals to the industry and are directional. The positive thing that you can take out of that is it really changes how you view compliance effectively as a strategy”.
The emerging verticals have allowed operators and key stakeholders to find new ways to acquire and retain customers, but their growth across America also provides a learning experience. The adolescence of new emerging verticals have caused operators and regulators to learn on the fly about how they fit into the puzzle of regulated gaming.
“In order to be proactive in the compliance space, knowledge is power,” said Grossman.
The knowledge operators and regulators gain can help dictate how they implement their compliance strategies, with each regulated gaming market in the U.S. having distinctive standards. Each U.S. jurisdiction has their own rules and regulations, but the markets also share similar principles that include know-your-customer, catalog and audit standards.
Regulators want key stakeholders to be successful
Regulators across the country have responded to some of the emerging verticals with questions and concerns regarding their legality and how they impact consumers in the U.S. The efforts by regulators to ensure operators adhere to their standards can be perceived as negative enforcement, but regulators only want what’s best for licensed operators.
“We want the operators to be successful, that’s the point,” continued Grossman. “We’re not there to be obstructionist or anything of that sense, but it [compliance] has to be done responsibly”.
Operators across the country have the responsibility of continuing to innovate and adjust their strategies to remain compliant as the gaming industry continues to grow.
The growth and popularity of commercial gaming, particularly sports betting, has led to regulation moving to the forefront of what drives movement for stakeholders in the industry.
“When you think about your compliance strategy, rather than thinking about it as a separate unit that lives to tick some boxes and fill out some forms, think about what convergence is going to look like and how you can actually operationalize rather than legalize compliance,” added Lever.
The gaming industry will continue to undergo constant change, and how stakeholders in gaming adjust to those changes will impact their approach to regulation. Those strategies will continue to take shape as new verticals and jurisdictions enter the U.S. gaming market.
Want to hear more stories like this? Check out the new SBC Media YouTube channel, the new home of all things multimedia at SBC, where our team deep-dives into the biggest stories from across the sports betting, iGaming, affiliate and payments industries.
