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Brazil Bans the Use of Credit Cards and Crypto for iGaming Payments

credit_cards_and_crypto_banned_under_brazil_payment_rulesBrazil, one of the largest regulated iGaming markets in the world, has set new rules which ban the use of credit cards and crypto currencies for payments related to gambling and sports betting.

The new rules were published by the Regulatory Policy of the Prizes and Betting Secretariat and the Ministry of Finance on 18 April in the national Official Diary of the Union, in the form of Normative Ordinance Number 615.

This new set of rules represents the beginning of the first stage of a four-part regulatory campaign that was presented last week by the country’s Ministry of Finance. This campaign will ultimately implement Bill 3,626, which was ratified by the Brazilian president in December 2023. The first stage is expected to be completed by the end of April and it will establish new rules regarding payments, technical aspects and security regulations.

Normative Ordinance Number 615 has established several new rules, with the first and most important being that iGaming operators in Brazil can no longer accept payments from credit cards, payments in crypto currencies or in cash. Moreover, payments in the form of payment slips or cheques are also prohibited.

All bets, withdrawals and payouts can be executed only through electronic transfers between the operators and their customers’ accounts. Moreover, the respective accounts have to be previously authorized by the Central Bank of Brazil. Operators will also have the obligation to deny payments from accounts not registered with the respective customer or from third parties.

Intermediaries between players and operators are strictly prohibited, but certain institutions authorized by the Central Bank are allowed to offer accounts on behalf of iGaming operators in some situations, for example to allow players to receive a prize that they won.

Winning Bets Paid Out in Less Than 2 Hours

Normative Ordinance Number 615 has also set a time limit for receiving prize payments on winning bets, operators must deliver that into the player’s account in at most 120 minutes.

The new rules also obligate operators to set up a virtual account for players in which they will be able to analyze details regarding their betting habits. This is expected to allow players to have a better understanding of their financial and betting information and make better decisions when it comes to managing their gameplay.

The respective virtual accounts will display the respective player’s betting history over the previous three years, with key aspects such as the total value of open bets and their financial balance on display.

Operators will also be in charge of managing their liquidity risk, including establishing a financial reserve of at least 5 million Brazilian Real, which would convert in around 950,000 U.S. dollars.

Source: “Credit cards and crypto banned under Brazil payment rules“. iGaming Business. April 18, 2024.

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New Legislation Bans Using Credit Cards for Online Betting in Australia

A lot is changing when it comes to Australian gambling law, and new legislation has just been passed. The use of credit cards as a payment method for placing online bets will be prohibited from now on, as the Australian Federal Parliament decided.

Important measure

Kai Cantwell, the CEO of Responsible Wagering Australia, supports this decision. He thinks that the country needs this decision since the residents will be allowed to gamble only with the money they actually have on their cards.

Cantwell commented: “This is an important measure to protect customers and their loved ones, making it easier for people to stay in control of their own gambling behavior. It will complement the existing offering of safer gambling account management tools by RWA members to customers to help them stay in control of their betting.”

Lotteries and keno issue

australian-parliament-passes-legislation-banning-online-credit-card-betting-He added that it was disappointing that some kinds of games, for example, lotteries and keno, were excluded from this ban since the lotteries are the most popular type of gambling in the country, especially in people from lower socioeconomic groups.

Only in 2020 and 2021 did citizens lose more than $3.2 billion playing these two types of games, according to the Australian Gambling Statistics. When online keno was legalized in Victoria, these numbers increased even further, and in 2022 and 2023, the losses increased by more than 400%.

There are other parts of the gambling law that lotteries are excluded from. There is also a National Self Exclusion Register, Betstop, so the Australians who already have excluded themselves from other forms of online gambling still have the opportunity to gamble up to $10.000 online by playing lotteries.

Cantwell added: “To effectively reduce gambling harm, consumer protection measures must exist across all forms of gambling. Otherwise, those at risk of harm will just move from one form of gambling to another less regulated type.”

Strict regulations

The industry is talking about the potential credit card ban from 2021. The RWA members collaborate with the federal government and financial institutions to deliver the best possible solutions when it comes to credit card bans and online gambling regulations. The institutions will continue to work hard on this, and the ban is supposed to be implemented in all online casinos in Australia within six months.

This is the newest regulation in the Australian market, but not the only one. Other prohibitions include banning external signage, reducing the cash-input limit, reducing the cap on machine entitlements, and others.

Source: Narayan, Niji, “Australian Parliament Passes Legislation Banning Online Credit Card Betting”. European Gaming. December 7. 2023.

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Missouri Man Shot Dad Dead, Hit Casino with His Credit Cards

A Lake Saint Louis, Mo. man suspected of shooting his father dead went to the Ameristar Casino St Charles with the victim’s credit card right after the alleged crime, The Saint Louis Dispatch reports.

Joseph M. Liszewski, Edward Liszewski, Lake Saint Louis, Ameristar St Charles
Joseph M. Liszewski in a Lake Saint Louis Police mugshot. The 39-year-old has admitted killing his father with a shotgun before heading out to the Ameristar Casino, according to a police report. (Image: KMOV)

Joseph M. Liszewski, 39, was charged with first-degree murder last Thursday following the discovery of his father’s body at the Lake Saint Louis home they shared.

When police later arrived at the house, Liszewski told them his father had inadvertently stepped on a shotgun and shot himself. That’s according to a probable cause statement seen by local media.

The suspect added that he didn’t know where his father was. Police suspected he had taken drugs.

Earlier, Liszewski was captured on security video at the Ameristar Casino St Charles, just hours after police suspect he killed his father.

Traumatic Event

Officers noticed there were dried drops of blood on the front porch of the house. In the hallway and kitchen, they found more blood, this time in splatters and pools, according to the report.

Officers concluded there was “obviously a traumatic event that had happened in the kitchen.”

Upstairs, they found the victim deceased and with a large gunshot wound to the left side of his face. He was covered by a comforter.

Police did not identify the victim by name. But neighbors who spoke to the Dispatch identified him as Edward Liszewski, 72.

Confession

Jospeh Liszewski, who has a history of DUI charges, was detained at the scene and booked on a $1 million bond. When police searched him, they found the suspect had his father’s bank cards and ID.

The suspect admitted that he and his father had gotten into an argument between midnight and 1am on Thursday morning.

He had killed his father in the kitchen with the shotgun, he stated. His father said, “You shot me, you shot me, you shot me,” according to the police report.

The suspect claimed he then tried to help his father by washing his face and placing towels on the wounds.

‘Blood and Guns’

Police were initially called to the crime scene after receiving a 911 call from a friend of the suspect. She had received text messages from Liszewski after he had returned from the casino.

Liszewski had told her “something terrible happened” and he “did it for her.”

The woman went to the house to check on him and found “blood and guns all over the place,” according to the probable cause statement.

Liszewski was also charged with armed criminal action and unlawful possession of a firearm.

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Aussie Banks Want Credit Cards Banned for Online Gambling

aussie_banks_want_credit_cards_banned_for_online_gamblingAustralia has no online casinos licensed in the country even though federal law allows states and territories to license and regulate internet slots and table games. However, home and mobile sports betting is licensed for punters there.

According to the country’s primary banking trade organization, there’s a big gap between financial protections online and on land so the Australian Banking Association (ABA) is asking the government to ban the use of credit cards at online sports betting sites.

The request comes decades after credit cards were banned for gambling at the land-based sportsbooks and casinos there. The licensed online gambling industry did not even exist at the time land-based credit card gambling was prohibited but is now worth an estimated A$50 billion a year.

Credit Cards Already Banned for Land-based Gambling

The ABA’s CEO, Anna Bligh asks: “Why should it be possible to do something in the virtual world that is prohibited in the real world? Every pub with poker machines, every TAB and every trackside bookie already implemented this 23 years ago.”

Bligh wonders if gambling, as a product “is this something we should be providing credit for given what’s happening to our customers?”

According to a report in the Guardian, banks are not on a moral crusade with the initiative but instead are looking out for their own business interests. That said, the association is quite aware of the damage undisciplined gamblers can do to themselves very quickly with potential long-term negative consequences.

“This is just a product that is not suitable for credit,” said Bligh. “You can accrue a very, very large amount of debt in an incredibly short period of time and have nothing to show for it.

“Banks have seen the harm that is being done and they are very conscious of their responsibility as lenders to ask [hard questions].

The initiative would tend to lend itself more to ideation than implementation due to the way merchant category codes work. The international merchant category code (MCC) that has been used for online gambling transactions since soon after the US changed its payment processor rules for online gambling with the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 (UIGEA) can also be assigned to transactions involving charities that fundraise by selling lottery tickets.

MCCs are 4-digit numbers listed under the international standard ISO 18245 which currently doesn’t have a code for lottery tickets sold primarily for charity fundraising. In order to create one, advocates would need to apply through ISO/TC 68, Technical Committee 68 on Banking, Securities, and other Financial Services in Geneva, Switzerland. However, changes to ISOs such as adding a new MCC, are usually not entertained for industries generating less than $10m in revenues.

The ABA doesn’t seem interested in paying for changes through the Geneva process, indicating that gambling operators should have to deal with and pay for compliance on their own after a grace period to give them time to adjust.

Licensed Operator Body Supports Ban

Responsible Wagering Australia is an independent body for wagering service providers based in Australia. RWA members include well-known names such as bet365, Betfair, Entain, PointsBet, Sportsbet, and Unibet.

A spokesperson for the group said: “The RWA and its members have been at the forefront of the work to implement a credit card ban – having led the discussions with the banking industry to determine the technical solutions, and delivered them to the government. We cannot speak for other non-member gambling companies.”

While offshore casinos can run credit card gambling transactions through a form of potential money laundering by assigning “the wrong code” to deposit transactions, a few Australian banks have already banned their branded credit cards from being used for gambling transactions, which presumably disallows the purchase of lottery tickets sold for charity fundraising with a credit card. Bank Australia, Bank of Queensland, Citibank, and Suncorp will no longer process MCC 7995.

MPs Sharkie and Wilkie are each preparing legislation to address the issue as well as to introduce suspicious transaction reports to authorities with Rebekha Sharkie’s private member bill focused on banning online credit card gambling and Andrew Wilkie’s bill focused on proceeds of crimes and suspicious transaction report obligations.

Sharkie also wants operators to be required to inform bettors of ongoing losses prior to accepting further bets.

Source: Australian banks urge Albanese government to ban use of credit cards for online gambling, The Guardian, March 26, 2023

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