Play by the book‍

Staying compliant when challenged with changing regulations and consistent money-laundering activity is never easy.

Head of Banking Relations at Soft2bet, Ludmila Andrianova, addresses her encounter with these issues and how an adequate compliance approach can give an operator long-lasting success.

‍‍‍

Joining an entirely unfamiliar field

Newly regulated markets are many these days, and that is the most complex fact about them. Analyzing the regulatory system of particular jurisdictions is the primary thing to do from a regulatory and compliance perspective when entering a brand-new market.

While at it, it's essential to pinpoint challenging areas to which we should shift most of our attention. That incorporates areas where operators should improve and intensify their internal operations, systems of control, and reporting.

Despite all the separate gambling regulations, one thing they have in common is strict KYC (Know Your Customer) requirements. Adequate and proper onboarding of players is what gambling operators lean on to help mitigate risk and establish compliance with national and global regulations.

The key to business growth and success is in the harmony between firm regulatory conditions for running a strict KYC check most effectively while reducing the inconvenience for the players and keeping their customer experience intact.

Present-day EU AML regulations obligate operators to use factual, risk-based methods to show the motive behind their decision-making. That makes the CDD and KYC procedures lengthier. Hence, incorporating automated onboarding solutions and monitoring tools operated by AI is essential nowadays, particularly if the company strives to be a leader in the industry.
‍

Effective compliance credentials‍

Business growth is based on new market entries. That is positive, but having more services on display makes compliance with regional and global demands tough. That is especially true when these services become more complicated. However, that can pay off for the company in the long-range.

The most apparent outcome of effective compliance is that it cuts down the risk of penalties, fines, lawsuits, reputation damages, and even business closures. In addition, a negative image of the business in the public eye from an AML and compliance outlook can be unfavorable to the organization. There have been many scandals where business reputations were ill-affected because of such actions.

Gaming companies that are cautious with AML procedures adhere to the guidelines, and fund education and awareness operations supported by regulators are always more reliable in the players' eyes. The public has continuously shown that they are more prone to opening an account with a well-regulated operator. It is simple to understand why. Players instinctively want to assure that their finances are protected and not handed to an operator that may misuse or misappropriate them.

‍

Betting with Cryptocurrencies

AML's primary goal in gambling is to prevent players from using finances that come from fraudulent and illegal activities on gaming sites and then representing them as ''clean'' upon withdrawal from their gaming accounts. That process is named layering, I.e., adding a layer of legitimacy to money taken by illegal means.

When a player adds a cryptocurrency channel to their gaming account, it makes the AML team's life a lot tougher. That is because it is more challenging to determine the origin of the crypto funds due to their compound nature. Still, I am against the intolerance of cryptocurrencies and see the fear of such deposit methods as an absence of an understanding of blockchain and crypto.

The education of Money Laundering Reporting Officers and their learning in practice how to work with crypto is the strongest resolution. The regulators across Europe tend to carry crypto exchanges to the regulatory scene and represent them as ‘’white’’ as possible. Therefore, betting with crypto will soon not differ from betting in any other way.

‍