Australia bans ‘synthetic lotteries’

Australian lawmakers passed the Interactive Gambling Act Amendment (Lottery Betting) Bill 2018 Thursday, effectively banning online secondary or synthetic lotteries such as those offered by Lottoland to its 700,000 regional customers.

The legislation comes into force six months from now to give those operators affected an opportunity to wind down their businesses.

Lottoland CEO Luke Brill reacted by assuring punters that his company was in Australia for the long haul and has already made good progress on a legitimate plan to continue operations. Whilst he was not specific in this regard, Brill has in the past hinted that an option may be to litigate against any ban as commercially protective and unconstitutional.

The banning bill, introduced in March this year by Communications Minister Mitch Fifield, followed a A$5 million campaign against Lottoland and secondary lottery action by the Tatts Group and news agent trade associations. Brill has claimed that this campaign was based on deliberate misinformation.

Lottoland has already offered a 20 percent revenue sharing scheme for retail lottery sellers who partner and promote its products; whilst some ticket sellers have rejected this out of hand, others have indicated a willingness to consider the offer (see previous reports).

Related and similar