Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov has reportedly asked President Vladimir Putin to legalise online gambling in the former Soviet Union.
Siluanov proposes a single operator that would remit “at least 30% of revenue after winnings” per month to the government, Kommersant reported on Tuesday. The plan could add about 100 billion roubles (US$1.3 billion) per year to the federal budget.
Supporters of the scheme frame it as a way to quash black market gambling and offer greater protections for players, including measures to reduce the risk of addiction.
Skeptics say it’s a way to offset losses from the war in Ukraine, which will enter its fourth year in February.
According to RBC Ukraine, the conflict has cost the Russian government more than 42 trillion roubles, “equivalent to 24 annual federal budgets for higher education in Russia or 22 annual healthcare budgets”. The human costs, too, have been staggering. According to a new study from the Center for Strategic and International Studies, military casualties on both sides could reach 2 million by spring.
Land-based casinos limited in Russia
Russia permits land-based casinos in a handful of special economic zones, including the Primorye Krai region near Vladivostok, home of Tigre de Cristal and Shambala. The legal industry is worth about 1.7 trillion roubles per year, according to the Finance Ministry.
Online gambling has been illegal in Russia since 2009. But the underground industry reportedly generates 3 trillion roubles in turnover annually, “with roughly 100 illicit platforms in operation”, per the Moscow Times.
Critics of the ministry’s plan say legal online gambling could harm people who are least equipped to absorb financial losses, like the poor and elderly. “Legalisation … is one of the tools to counteract the illegal market, but not the only one,” said Vasily Riy, executive director of the Association for the Protection of the Rights of Gambling and Lottery Participants. “Legalisation in many countries in various forms shows that, in the absence of proper state control, the effect can be the opposite.”
Will Russia bring iGaming to occupied Ukraine?
Meanwhile, Russia may be planning to bring online casinos to temporarily occupied territories (TOT) in Ukraine as “a tool of war financing”.
The initiative will rely on “the forced participation of the population”, claims the National Resistance Centre, an arm of the Ukrainian Special Operations Forces. The NRC says the legalisation of casinos in the TOT is another example of “exploitation of the occupied territories”, which will effectively force Ukrainian civilians to “maintain the occupation regime under the direct control of the Kremlin”.