{"id":777044741,"date":"2026-07-10T08:38:07","date_gmt":"2026-07-10T11:38:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/?p=777044741"},"modified":"2026-07-10T08:38:33","modified_gmt":"2026-07-10T11:38:33","slug":"kazakhstan-pm-says-banks-blocked-us21m-in-illegal-online-casino-payments-in-six-months","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/kazakhstan-pm-says-banks-blocked-us21m-in-illegal-online-casino-payments-in-six-months","title":{"rendered":"Kazakhstan PM says banks blocked US$21m in illegal online casino payments in six months"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Olzhas Bektenov says 402,000 gambling-related transactions were stopped between October 2025 and March 2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Kazakhstan.- Prime Minister Olzhas Bektenov<\/strong> has informed Kazakhstan’s Parliament that banks blocked 402,000 gambling-related transactions <\/strong>worth more than KZT10bn (US$21m) over six months ending in March 2026<\/strong>. He said the country had also blacklisted foreign online casino operators and 110 payment providers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since the start of the year, authorities have opened 15 criminal cases covering 40 instances of illegal online casino activity and detained 11 financial sector employees accused of assisting such activity, he said. In addition, 1,144 bank cards used by alleged money mules have been frozen, with further investigations under way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The country\u2019s Unified System for Accounting of Betting and Gambling Games, launched in March, had identified approximately 433,000 people by early June and blocked more than 135,000 from placing bets<\/strong>. Most of those excluded were registered debtors, while others had voluntarily self-excluded or were subject to additional legal restrictions.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n\t\t\tSee also:<\/span><\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\tSee also:<\/span> Azerbaijan Central Bank sounds warning over extent illegal gambling payments<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Olzhas Bektenov says 402,000 gambling-related transactions were stopped between October 2025 and March 2026.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":680,"featured_media":777028000,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"is_press_release":false,"is_interview":false,"is_opinion":false,"focusai_summary":"Kazakhstan's Prime Minister Olzhas Bektenov reported significant enforcement actions against illegal gambling, including blocking over 400,000 transactions worth KZT10bn and blacklisting foreign online casino operators and 110 payment providers. Authorities have also initiated criminal cases, detained financial sector employees, and frozen bank cards, while the new Unified System for Accounting of Betting and Gambling Games has identified and blocked over 135,000 individuals.","focusai_entities":"Olzhas Bektenov, Kazakhstan's Parliament","focusai_location":"Kazakhstan","focusai_target_profile":"ceo_executive (0.9), regulator (1.0), compliance_legal (0.95), operator_casino (0.9), affiliate_publisher (0.85), product_ux (0.7), tech_data (0.9), marketing_crm (0.75), payments_fraud_aml (1.0), investor_analyst (0.9), supplier_vendor (0.9), journalist_researcher (0.95)","focusai_suggestions":[{"label":"Enforcement Impact on GGR","query":"What is the projected impact of these stringent enforcement actions and the Unified System for Accounting on Kazakhstan's regulated GGR and NGR, considering the significant volume of blocked illegal transactions?"},{"label":"Payment Provider Due Diligence","query":"What enhanced due diligence and compliance frameworks are now expected from payment providers operating in or facilitating transactions for the Kazakhstan market, given the blacklisting of 110 entities?"}],"footnotes":""},"categories":[16331,439],"tags":[25294,24971,24634,24887],"class_list":["post-777044741","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-elsewhere-news","category-legal-news","tag-block","tag-gambling-related-transactions","tag-illegal-online-gambling","tag-kazakhstan"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/777044741","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/680"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=777044741"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/777044741\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":777044750,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/777044741\/revisions\/777044750"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/777028000"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=777044741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=777044741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=777044741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}