SWEDISH GAMING INDUSTRY DEMANDS ANSWERS OVER GROWING BANKING FIASCO

Sweden’s online gambling industry trade body, Branschföreningen för Onlinespel (BOS), has asked the Swedish Financial Authority (Finansinspektionen) to explain why banks are refusing to provide services to licensed operators. 

According to BOS, most of its members have now experienced unexpected account closures, and the abrupt termination of vital services, often without any explanation at all. 

Gustaf Hoffstedt, General Secretary of BOS, explained: “The banks fulfil an important task in any society and for every industry. The online gambling industry is not an exception, quite the opposite with our industry’s transaction intensity.

“With this in mind it concerns me that a large number of banks are withdrawing their services to Swedish licensed gambling operators, and apparently without any individual due diligence process. The decision seems to have been taken based only on the industry’s general reputation rather than any AML concern or similar from the bank regarding the individual client.”

In its communication with Finansinspektionen, BOS stressed how critical access to comprehensive banking services is for day-to-day operations, including being essential for enabling licensed operators to compete with unlicensed offshore operators, and to effectively prevent money laundering and terrorist financing. 

AYO.NEWS says:

This isn’t the first time we’ve seen this kind of thing happen. Back in 2019, we reported how legitimate Malta-based businesses were finding it ever more difficult to access banking, as financial service providers used ever-tightening anti-money laundering rules to justify refusing or withdrawing services. 

Taking a step back, the current Swedish issues are merely part of a much wider problem, in which well meaning politicians and bureaucrats have introduced rafts of new regulations that are, while great on paper, fundamentally flawed and unworkable in the real-world. The end result is very little effect on organised crime, but an increasingly damaging impact on legitimate businesses. 

Stepping back even further, we’re seeing the endemic silo mentality of governments, regulators, and ‘experts’, lead to well-intentioned, but ultimately damaging, policies in everything from data protection (can anyone say “GDPR”) to the response to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

We guess it’s a sign of the times…