Dark Spiral

About Dark Spiral

Rangers vs. Royal Antwerp (Agg 4-3) (5.55pm GMT kick-off)

Shakhtar Donetsk vs. Maccabi Tel-Aviv (Agg 2-0) (5.55pm GMT kick-off)

Hoffenheim vs. Molde (Agg 3-3) (5.55pm GMT kick-off)

What is Dark Spiral?

The ARGN’s launch follows the inaugural Africa Safer Gambling Week earlier this month.

Hosted by the African iGaming Alliance, the week brought together a range of stakeholders in the African sector.

CEO Peter Kesitilwe recently told iGB he hopes the first Africa Safer Gambling Week will be the beginning of a new era of collaboration that boosts player protection efforts.

What is Dark Spiral?

On Wednesday, New Jersey Attorney General Jennifer Davenport announced that her office had filed a petition for writ of certiorari following an appeals court verdict from earlier this year that went in favour of prediction markets. That 2-1 verdict from the Third Circuit Court of Appeals was handed down in April, and New Jersey had until Thursday to petition the high court.

The petition poses the question of whether the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, which was enacted in 2010 in the aftermath of the Great Recession, “preempted states from regulating sports bets that occur within their jurisdictions if those bets are offered on markets registered with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission”. Prediction markets have argued that their event contracts are financial derivatives regulated by the CFTC whereas many states contend that they are simply sports bets by another name.

There is no guarantee the Supreme Court will hear the case but a separate appeals court ruling from 28 August bolsters its chances. In that case, a three-judge panel from the Ninth Circuit ruled unanimously in favour of the state of Nevada, creating a circuit court split, which is a hallmark of many Supreme Court cases.