Swedish Supreme Administrative Court to grant regulator appeal over igaming fine
The court has granted an appeal from Spelinspektionen against the reduction of a fine it issued to Genesis Global for self-exclusion violations.
Sweden.- For the first time, Sweden’s Supreme Administrative Court has agreed to hear an appeal on a sanction imposed on an online gambling operator by the national regulator Spelinspektionen. The regulator appealed to the court after lower courts reduced the size of a fine it issued against Genesis Global in 2019 for self-exclusion violations.
Spelinspektionen welcomed the court’s decision, saying it was positive development that its rulings would be analysed by the Supreme Administrative Court.
The regulator had issued Genesis with a warning and a SEK4m (€376,100) fine after it found that several people signed up to Sweden’s national self-exclusion system Spelpaus had been able to access Genesis Global’s gambling sites, which include Sloty, Play.com and Casino Joy.
The offences took place in March 2019, less than three months after the launch of Sweden’s online gambling market.
In December 2019, the Court of Appeal in Linköping halved the penalty fee to SEK2m. After a second appeal to the Court of Appeal in Jönköping, the fine was cut further to SEK1m.
On both occasions, the courts found that Spelinspektionen had made a mistake in the way that it calculated the size of the penalty, using inaccurate figures that projected annual turnover from just two months.
However, Spelinspektionen appealed against that ruling to the Supreme Administrative Court which has now agreed to look at whether the violation merited a fine and how that fine was calculated.
Swedish financial watchdog fines Trustly for AML breach
Meanwhile, Spelinspektionen has also welcomed action by Sweden’s financial watchdog Finansinspektionen against the payment provider Trustly. The body issued a SEK130m fine to Trustly due to anti-money laundering (AML) failings.
Spelinspektionen said: “Spelinspektionen views Finansinspektionen’s supervision of the payment service intermediary Trustly Group positively and closely monitors the development of the payment service intermediaries that provide their services to gaming companies with a Swedish licence.
“The Swedish Gaming Inspectorate will analyse the Swedish Financial Supervisory Authority’s decision and see if there are parts of the decision that we should take into account in our continued development of guidance to the licensed gaming companies and in our own supervision.”
Skolinspektionen unit manager Robert Larsson said that payment providers had extra responsibilities because they can see customer actions across different operators.
He said: “Trustly has a special exposure to the gaming industry and through its unique overall perspective, the company can see its customers’ collective transactions to various gaming companies.”
