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EU iGaming Weekly: BGC’s £800m Forecast, Entain’s FTSE Exit, and Curaçao’s New Onboarding Rules

By jili tutorial · August 31, 2026

EU iGaming Weekly: BGC’s £800m Forecast, Entain’s FTSE Exit, and Curaçao’s New Onboarding Rules

The Betting and Gaming Council projects up to £800 million in illegal bets on the Premier League this season, a University of Nottingham study finds gambling branding on screen for nearly a third of highlights footage, Entain is set to be demoted from the FTSE 100, and Curaçao’s remote onboarding rules have officially taken effect. Here’s your roundup of the week’s biggest stories.

BGC Predicts £800 Million in Illegal Premier League Betting This Season

The Betting and Gaming Council (BGC) warned on 24 August that the illegal gambling market could accept up to £800 million in bets during the 2026/27 Premier League season—the first campaign without gambling brands on the front of matchday shirts. The trade body estimates that around £20 million was staked with criminal operators over the opening weekend alone, and projects that figure will rise by another £200 million next year, reaching approximately £1 billion.

The BGC links this surge to tax increases. General Betting Duty currently stands at 15% on bookmakers’ profits, but from 1 April 2027 a separate 25% rate will apply to online bets (remote horse racing and self-service terminal bets remain at 15%). Remote Gaming Duty has already climbed from 21% to 40% as of 1 April 2026, and Gambling Commission operating licence fees are set to increase by 25% from 1 October 2026.

Gambling Branding Appears in a Third of Premier League Highlights

A pre-print study from the University of Nottingham, posted on 19 August, reveals that gambling branding was visible during 32.4% of the footage in Sky Sports’ YouTube highlights of the final 10 games of the 2025/26 Premier League season. By contrast, official FIFA highlights of the 2026 World Cup showed gambling branding for only 1.5% of the time.

Gambling brands also accounted for 10 of the 12 pre-roll adverts served before the Premier League highlight packages, representing 123 of 153 total advertising seconds. None of the World Cup adverts featured a gambling brand.

The placement breakdown is critical for policy. Front-of-shirt logos made up 27.1% of all gambling appearances—the only placement covered by the Premier League’s voluntary ban. Pitchside boards and LED screens carried 50.4%, stadium signage 10.1%, and sleeve logos 5.4%.

Entain Set to Drop Out of the FTSE 100

On 25 August, FTSE Russell listed Entain among the indicative deletions from the FTSE 100, based on data as of 21 August. The gambling group is expected to move to the FTSE 250, alongside Persimmon, while easyJet and Ithaca Energy are the indicative promotions. The final review will use closing data on 1 September, with confirmed changes announced after the close on 2 September.

A constituent is demoted when its full market capitalisation falls below 110th place. Entain shares traded at 517p on the morning of 27 August, valuing the company at around £3.3 billion. The decline follows the remote gaming duty increase, which pushed H1 2026 underlying EBITDA down 2% despite net gaming revenue growing 5% in constant currency.

Sell-side analysts remain bullish. All seven analysts tracked by MarketBeat rate the stock a buy, with an average twelve-month target price of 992p.

Allwyn Counts Summer Winners as MPs Question Interim CEO

Allwyn announced on 25 August that its two summer game launches—the revamped Lotto format (10 June) and Powerball (21 July)—have produced 56 millionaires and nearly one million winning prizes. This compares to 35 millionaires over the same June-to-August period in 2025. Notably, 32 of the 56 millionaires won in Round 2 of the new two-round Lotto, meaning they would not have won under the old format. Powerball has created 997,038 winners, paid out over £13.8 million, and attracted around 40,000 first-time National Lottery players.

The figures arrive amid a leadership transition. Labour MP Dawn Butler and Conservative MP Iain Duncan Smith have written to the Gambling Commission expressing “deep concern” over the appointment of Phil Walker as Allwyn UK’s interim chief executive. They point to the personal sanction the Commission imposed on Walker in 2024 for anti-money laundering and terrorist financing control failures at William Hill, as well as his non-executive role at City Gaming, which owns the Game Nation arcade chain.

The Gambling Commission declined to comment on an operator’s personnel decisions. Walker steps down from Game Nation on 1 September and begins his role at Allwyn UK on 7 September.

Curaçao Enforces Binding Rules for Remote Onboarding

On 21 August, the Curaçao Gaming Authority, the Central Bank of Curaçao and Sint Maarten, and the Financial Intelligence Unit Curaçao jointly brought into force new provisions on remote identification and verification. These rules implement Article 3, paragraph 1 of the National Ordinance on Identification when Rendering Services, and apply to all service providers in scope—not just gaming licensees.

Previously, the only accepted method for a customer who was not physically present was a certified copy of an identity document. Now, identity can be established using a driving licence, identity card, or passport, validated either by certification or by technology such as ID-scanning software or videoconferencing. Unattended tools must include liveness detection and algorithms benchmarked against ISO, IEC, or NIST standards. Attended tools require trained staff and a defined escalation process. No system may go live without a documented risk assessment and impersonation fraud testing.

Providers without a remote onboarding tool must comply before launching one; those already using a solution have until 1 May 2027 to meet the new standards. Sanctions range from fines and licence revocation to imprisonment.

What to Watch Next Week

Entain’s demotion is not final until FTSE Russell publishes the review results after the close on Wednesday, 2 September. The review itself uses Tuesday’s closing data, so the company’s position could still shift.

The Department for Culture, Media and Sport consultation on banning sponsorship by unlicensed gambling operators closes at 11:59 pm on 9 September. The BGC is pushing for any ban to extend beyond football to all UK sports.

Phil Walker takes up the Allwyn UK role on 7 September. The Gambling Commission has only said it will not comment on personnel decisions, so whether it responds publicly to the MPs remains uncertain.

In Curaçao, the immediate focus is on documentation: written assessments, monitoring schedules, and an evidence trail that supervisors can inspect.