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The ban of the unibet.com cycling team in some competitions is Italy, Belgium and Spain because the had the main sponsor an online betting company in Malta the triggered the European Commission anger that thretaned these countries with legal actions.
“The Commission understands that the Green Cycle Associates cycling team, a Swedish company, has been refused entry to two races in the Belgian UCI,†a letter obtained by Reuters said.
According to The Guardian, EU Internal Market Commissioner Charlie McCreevy had earlier warned France over the same issue, and a Commission official told Reuters that Brussels would step up legal action against the French government in June over its enforcement of anti-betting laws governing cycling and all other sports.”There is clear evidence that France has breached EU internal market rules, following an analysis of the situation“, said the official,
“Sport clubs throughout Europe… are facing unfair sponsorship restrictions and also missing significant competition opportunities,” Konstantinos Maragkakis, spokesman for the European Gaming and Betting Association said.
Meanwhile, let’s have a look at the Giro D’Italia winner odds at Gamebookers
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Even though the Svenska Spel monopoly was criticized by the Swedish Parliament , it will probably keep its monopolyaccording with the Swedish economic journal, Veckans Affärer, because it gets a lot of money to the state budget – Q1 of 2007 – net profit of €157 million.
So the state will put hard-to-meet conditions for new entrants, so nobody will buy a license. Sweden’s finance minister, Anders Borg lied in the electoral campaign when he promised to to abolish the state gambling monopoly.
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Those 3 domains are still up for sale according , after the Casino Affiliate Convention in Amsterdam that took place at the end of the last week.
CasinoWire confirmed that interested buyers of these websites should email their offers to sales at moniker.com, where bids will be considered by the sellers.
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The study is called by the Nevada congresswoman Shelley Berkley that wants to put it as part of a bill against the UIGEA.
Berkley, a self-confessed campaigner against the prohibition laws in America, is keen to see the UIGEA repealed. However, she wishes to make clear her stance on stimulating an objective viewpoint.
She recently told a Las Vegas journal, “One of the advantages of this legislation is that it doesn’t take a side. It doesn’t say internet gambling is good or bad. It says ‘Let’s study the issue.â€
The bill has some house support, with 60 co-sponsors of the bill including Barney Frank, John Conyers and Frank LoBiondo.
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 This was the highest price paid for a gambling domain name at the Casino Affiliate Convention in Amsterdam that took place at the end of the last week.
Other important sales were made on these domain names :
betsmarts.com and sportsbookpros.com 18,500 USD
Spades.net 5,000 USD
VegasCasino.net 4,800 USD
BettingOdds.com 3,630 USD
FreeBlackjack.net 2,400 USD
Sportsbook.vc 1,800 USD
AboutPoker.com 1,200 USD
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PartyGaming, the well known company that has created brands such as PartyPoker, PartyBingo or PartyGammon, has recently announced that it has subscribed to a large affiliate fraud monitoring contract with Envisional, a company that ises its A3I intelligent search technology to identify, analyse and verify all suspected cases of affiliation to PartyGaming’s websites and detect any abuse of PartyGaming’s name and brands.
Envisional’s A3I – Advanced Automated Artificial Intelligence – technology scans the world wide web for text, logos or images including those used on blogs, auction sites, trade boards, Internet Relay Chat channels and peer-to-peer networks, listing results in order of urgency and importance.
With this ocasion Martin Weigold, Group Finance Director with executive responsibility for corporate social responsibility at PartyGaming, said: ‘We take our legal obligations and ethical responsibilities very seriously. Envisional’s advanced artificial intelligence capabilities will help us ensure continued compliance with strict marketing regulations, as well as protect the party brands in which we have invested so heavily over the years.’
Also a recent news from PartyGaming confirms hthe immediate appointment of Tim Bristow (51) to the Board as an independent non-executive director.
Bristow, who is a chartered accountant, is the Chief Executive Officer of Gibtelecom Limited, Gibraltar’s primary telecommunications provider, a position he has held since 2001 when the company was founded. From 1997 to early 2007, he served as the Gibraltar Government’s Financial and Development Secretary. He was also formally a director at the National Audit Office, London and Private Secretary to the Comptroller and Auditor General.
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The Swedish online betting exchange, casino and poker operator Redbet Holding has announced last week the purchase of 98% of purchase a 98 per cent of Teletoto Ltd, the only state licensed National Gaming License for both retail bookmaking and online gaming in Lithuania.
Teletoto that has 20 betting shops and plans to go into online betting as well was acquired through a new share issue valued at €1.55 million.
Redbet CEO Jonas Sundvall declared :
“This acquisition provides Redbet with a strong position in the fast growing Baltic gambling market. The acquisition will also enable Redbet to locate certain operative functions to Lithuania in order to benefit from reduced operating costs. “
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Hugarian State Gambling Monopoly, Szerencsejáték Zrt, has announced plans for expanding its services for the Internet. The monopoly is, of course (!), the biggest provider of gambling services in Hungary and has sole rights to supply number draw games, sports bets and prize draw tickets throughout the country and also has interests in four Hungarian casinos.
Szerencsejáték Zrt CEO , Gábor Székely, has announced this week the bid for IT equipement for the necessary expansion in the Internet, but the whole process could take at least 18 months, due to the neccesary legal procedures.
Apparantly not all the games could be played by every EU citizens and some games, including lotteries, can not be played by foreign residents, as they have no registered address or bank account in Hungary.
This move might come in conjunction withe the 2006 request of the European Commission that Hungary open up its sportsbetting market to other EU member states in order to fulfil the EU’s key objective of free movement of goods and services.
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According with an official press release, a new mobile gambling solution is available for spanish users. The Palace online gambling group subsidiary powered by Microgaming and marketed as Zero36 Spanish Casino Games are now available for direct download either through the Spanish Zero36 website or through Zero36′s Spanish WAP site when using any mobile Internet browser.
Zero36 “Play for Fun” games are additionally available for download through Movistar emocin (Telefonica) following the recently signed distribution contract between Telefonica (Spain) and Zero36.
Zero36 recently announced the development of a Location-Based Filtering System for use with mobile applications, enabling legal mobile access to mobile gambling and betting applications according to the user’s geographic location.
Zero36 is currently exploring licensing options for mobile gambling operations throughout Spain’s different regions, which have different gambling-related laws. Zero36′s Location-Based Filtering System will enable legal mobile gambling according to the specific laws of the region where a mobile phone user is located.
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says Director General of the WTO, Pascal Lamy, when talking at a meeting of the Ministers of Trade, making a reference to the rulings and recommendations of the WTO Dispute Settlement Body.
Acording with Antigua Sun newspaper, he responded to a question put to him by Antigua and Barbuda’s Minister of Finance and the Economy, Dr Errol Cort, who wanted to know how the WTO intends to ensure that the rights of its smallest members are treated in the same manner as its largest.
Lamy said that it is in the best interest of the major trading nations of the world to ensure that the organs of the WTO are seen as fully functional and, in the case of its Dispute Settlement system, that its rulings and recommendations are respected and fully implemented.
