Stake set to leave GB market

The UK’s Gambling Commission has announced that Stake will leave the Great Britain (GB) market from next month following the launch of an investigation into advertising by the company.

The investigation involves a video featuring an adult actress outside Nottingham Trent University, distributed on social media.

TGP Europe Limited (TGP) operates the site under a white-label arrangement. TGP has previously been the subject of enforcement action and, following a meeting with the Commission, has agreed to stop accepting new registrations to the Stake.uk.com platform and remove redirection links from the main Stake website.

The final shutdown of the GB site will take place by March 11, 2025. However, as you can see from the screenshot above, it is already preventing users in the UK from accessing the site.

This is not the first investigation the Gambling Commission has taken against TGP. They were fined more than £300,000 in April 2023 for anti-money laundering and social responsibility failures.

In response to the notice, Stake and TGP have mutually agreed to end white-label agreements. Stake will now look to secure local licenses through its in-house platform and operations.

Earlier this week, Stake received authorization to operate in the newly regulated Brazil market, which complements its existing activity in Colombia and Peru.

Complicating matters in the UK is the fact that Stake is the current front-of-shirt sponsor of English Premier League Football Club Everton F.C.

The Gambling Commission has revealed it will be writing to Everton and two other football clubs with warnings about the risks of promoting unlawful gambling websites.

As part of this process, the Commission will seek assurances from Everton that they have done their due diligence on white-label partners and that consumers in Great Britain cannot interact with the unlicensed site.

Everton will be asked to demonstrate that they have received assurances about the site’s effective geo-blocking. However, the Commission accepts that some of these measures can be easily bypassed using tools such as a Virtual Private Network (VPN). 

The Commission will also independently verify the effectiveness of these measures.

Non-compliance could mean club officers are liable to prosecution for promoting unlicensed gambling businesses. 

Finally, the Commission stated that it expects an orderly closure of the websites and that the operator must provide clear information to consumers on how to obtain their funds.