Swedish Gambling Authority claims fines against operators are “too low”

The Swedish Gambling Authority (SGA) has asked Sweden’s Ministry of Finance to increase the maximum penalty fee for egaming operators guilty of AML breaches, calling the current level “too low”.

In a letter to the ministry, the SGA claimed the gambling sector can be “attractive” to money launderers due to the easy access and large sums of money involved in online gambling.

The SGA asserts that to counter this it must create “good incentives” for Swedish-licensed operators to follow the Swedish Money Laundering Act, citing tangible and dissuasive penalty fees as a key component in this process.

At present the SGA can fine an operator up to a maximum level of €1m, something which it claims is not “sufficiently noticeable” to larger online operators.

Qualifying this statement, the SGA points to the fact that the 10 largest companies licensed for online gambling and sports betting had turnover of between SEK173m and SEK3.5bn during the first three quarters of 2019.

“The Gaming Inspectorate considers it important that sanction fees are effective, proportionate and dissuasive in the manner specified in the Money Laundering Directive,” the SGA said.

The SGA claims that fines for violations of the Swedish Money Laundering Act should be subject to the same levels as those being levied for violations of the Swedish Gaming Act, which is currently set at 10% of a licence holder’s turnover during the previous year.

However, the term turnover is not currently defined in Swedish gambling laws. This was highlighted earlier this week, when the Swedish Administrative Court in Linköping reduced fines previously levied against operators Aspire Global and Genesis Communications.