Stake to exit the UK following Gambling Commission investigation 

Stake is set to leave the UK market after the Gambling Commission (GC) announced it would “no longer be a licensed website from next month”.

TGP Europe, which operates Stake.uk.com as part of a white-label agreement, has stated that it will be shutting down the website by 11 March.  

Following a meeting with the GC, TGP Europe will immediately stop new registrations and remove redirection links from the main Stake website.

The move comes after the GC launched an investigation into a video posted to social media containing the Stake logo and which “featured an adult actress outside Nottingham Trent University”. 

Stake is currently the front-of-shirt sponsor for Premier League side Everton, a deal which came into effect from the start of the 2022-23 season, yet it’s unclear at this stage how the closure of Stake.uk.com affects this deal.

The GC has said it plans to write to Everton and “two other football clubs with unlicensed sponsors” warning of the risks of promoting unlicensed gambling sites.  

The regulator has also issued a warning to football teams that club officials could face prosecution if they facilitate the promotion of unlicensed gambling.

TGP Europe was previously fined by the GC in April 2023 for anti-money laundering and social responsibility failings.  

A GC statement said: “The Commission will seek assurance from the clubs that they have carried out due diligence on their white-label partners and that consumers in Great Britain cannot transact with the unlicensed sites. 

“Clubs will be asked to demonstrate that they have assurance that any steps to geo-block the sites are effective, recognising that some blocking can be easily bypassed by use of tools such as a Virtual Private Network. 

“Clubs will be expected to carry out sufficient due diligence to assure the Commission that consumers cannot transact with the sites from Great Britain by any means. The Commission will also be taking steps to independently verify effective measures are in place. 

“The letter will warn that club officers may be liable to prosecution and, if convicted, face a fine, imprisonment or both if they promote unlicensed gambling businesses that transact with consumers in Great Britain.” 

Stake’s exiting of the UK market comes after the operator obtained its licence for the burgeoning regulated Brazil market earlier this week.  

The Melbourne-headquartered operator first arrived in the UK in 2021 and used the TGP Europe platform rather than parent company Easygo’s proprietary software deployed in the international markets where Stake is available.

Stake.uk.com is one of 12 white labels piggybacking off TGP Europe’s GC licence. Other brands listed on the GC website include Asia-facing Fun88, TLCBet and 12Bet, as well as crypto operators Duelbits and Sportsbet.io.

Stake has been pushing into regulated markets of late, including the acquisition of Italy-licensed Idealbet last July, along with the purchase of Betfair’s Colombian business from Flutter Entertainment in 2023.

Besides two offices in Melbourne and one in Sydney, Easygo has hubs in Serbia, Colombia, Peru, Brazil and soon Italy and Canada’s Ontario. More than 1,000 people are employed across the group.

Last year, Stake secured the naming rights to the Alfa Romeo F1 team as part of a two-year deal.

Easygo co-founders, Ed Craven and Bijan Tehrani, hold a 5% position in Australian and Canadian bookmaker PointsBet, while they also own Kick, a casino and video-gaming streaming platform that racked up 1.8 billion hours watched by December 2024.

A Stake spokesperson said: “Stake has made a strategic decision in mutual agreement with TGP Europe to exit white-label agreements and focus on securing local licences through our in-house platform and operations, building upon our growth in key regulated markets such as our recent expansions into Italy and Brazil.”