The roles of the unit will include gathering intelligence and information related to suspicious betting and will work in liaison with local and foreign regulatory authorities, law enforcement agencies, betting monitoring systems, sporting bodies and gaming operators in order to investigate irregular and suspicious betting activity. 

MGA Senior Executive Antonio Zerafa as Sports Integrity Officer will represent the head of the unit. Mr Zerafa has been at the MGA for four years and has held various positions within the Criminal Probity Screening Department, as well as the Enforcement Directorate as Secretary to the MGA’s Fit and Proper Committee. 

“Having a dedicated Sports Integrity Unit is vital for the MGA’s statutory objective to ensure that gambling is free from crime, specifically the manipulation of sports competitions,” said Heathcliff Farrugia, MGA’s Chief Executive Officer.  

“The MGA is committing to cooperation with stakeholders to the extent permitted by law to act against a pervasive phenomenon that threatens the integrity of both the sports and the betting industries,” Mr Farrugia added. 

In addition, Mr Zerafa has a Degree in Criminology from the University of Malta where he is also a visiting lecturer, a Master’s Degree in Counter Fraud and Counter Corruption Studies from the University of Portsmouth, and is currently reading for a PhD in Law and Criminology with a focus on gaming-related crime at the Sheffield Hallam University.

The post MGA launches new sports integrity unit first appeared on The Malta Business Weekly.

The SBK sportsbook app “combines industry-disrupting odds” with a “social-focused interface” for offering a “fair and fun app” for betting on sports events and politics. Prices on SBK are the same as those on the Smarkets exchange that runs on a peer-to-peer model and proprietary technology.

The SBK is promised to benchmark its prices directly against a wide range of bookmakers and show users how often they are getting the best odds with the SBK Price+ feature, which will initially compare odds on football before incorporating the app’s entire event offering.

Registration for the app starts tomorrow — 9 August, Friday —, which day marks the commencement of betting on the platform after a private test mode that has run for the past 12 months.

“By combining innovative technology with transparent and fair odds, I believe we are able to offer a product like no other in the market, which will help us continue to have an impact in an industry dominated by a few big players who do not seek to give customers the best value,” Smarkets CEO and Founder Jason Trost said.

“While some bettors prefer the advanced features of Smarkets, we created SBK for those customers that want the better pricing of an exchange with the cleaner interface of a sportsbook,” the CEO added.

Founded in 2008, Smarkets is a sports betting company headquartered in London, with offices in Los Angeles and Malta. “We are very committed to the Maltese market. We have had an office there for several years,” Pascal Lemesre, Public Relations Manager of Smarkets told Business Malta.

“In the first instance, SBK will launch in the United Kingdom before being rolled out to other regulated markets, including Malta. I cannot say exactly when SBK will launch in Malta but we are currently seeking approval and we hope it will be in the very near future,” Mr Lemesre added.

The post Smarkets launches sportsbook app SBK, keeps commitment to Malta first appeared on The Malta Business Weekly.