The black market report that needs a second look!

I want to start with something important. If an operator is not licensed, operates in a grey market or targets UK players unlawfully, it deserves scrutiny. There is no debate about that. What I am questioning here is not whether scrutiny is needed. It is who delivers it, who funds it and who benefits from it.

That difference matters more than people want to admit.

Who published the MyStake report?

The UK black market report targeting MyStake was published under the banner of GAMSR and Deal Me Out, led by Jordan Lea. On paper, this looks like a public-interest initiative. A harm-reduction organisation exposing illegal or harmful gambling activity. That framing is powerful. But once you step back and look at funding, history and incentives, the picture becomes far less clean.

The Genting question no one wants to address!

Deal Me Out did not appear from nowhere. A few years ago, the organisation was effectively kept alive after receiving financial support from Genting. The reported amount was around £40,000. That matters because Genting operates its online gambling services through SkillOnNet.

Now ask a very simple question: If an unlicensed or grey-market operator like MyStake is pushed out of the UK market, where do those players go?

They do not disappear. They migrate. And they migrate into the white market. Into licensed platforms. Into operators that are structurally connected to the very companies that fund the organisations publishing the report. That does not mean the report is wrong. But it does mean it cannot be treated as neutral.

Follow the benefit, not the headline…

When a black market operator loses access to players, several things happen at once. Signups increase elsewhere. GGR increases elsewhere. Retention improves elsewhere. The beneficiaries are not abstract concepts. They are mostly licensed operators.

And when a gambling harm organisation is funded by the industry, it is reasonable to ask how independent its conclusions can really be. Again, not an accusation. A governance question.

Industry funding and selective focus!

The report itself states, in its disclosure section, that the organisation receives funding from the gambling industry. That alone should force caution. If your funding depends on the white market, then your incentives align naturally with white market interests. That does not make the work invalid.

But it does mean that targeting one operator while avoiding wider platform-level analysis creates a narrow lens. If you only point at one problem, you never have to upset your donors.

One operator, one narrative!

This report focuses aggressively on MyStake. What it does not do is meaningfully examine platform concentration, white-label ecosystems or the fact that many licensed operators benefit directly from black-market displacement. That is a choice. And choices reveal perspective.

The removed pages problem!!!

There is another issue that I find deeply troubling. Roughly 20 percent of the report was removed before publication, with an explanation that legal risk made publication problematic. At the same time, the authors state that these removed sections were still submitted to regulators.

That creates a strange situation: If material is too risky to publish publicly, but acceptable to submit confidentially to a regulator, what exactly is happening?

The public is protected from seeing it. The affected companies are not.

In my view, that is a serious ethical problem.

Scared to publish, brave enough to accuse!

If you genuinely believe material is solid, defensible and accurate, you publish it. If you are worried about defamation, NDA exposure or legal blowback, you do not quietly pass it to authorities while protecting yourself publicly. You cannot have it both ways. Either the material stands on its own, or it does not.

How regulators will read this?

If this report ends up on the desk of the UK Gambling Commission, one obvious question will arise.

• Why were large sections removed from public view?
• Why should regulators rely on material that the authors were unwilling to publish openly?

Regulators are not naive. They understand incentives. They understand funding. They understand industry politics. This kind of contradiction does not strengthen credibility. It weakens it.

Two sides of the coin

This report presents one side of the story. The most negative version. The most damaging angle. The most headline-friendly narrative. What it does not do is show the other side. Who gains market share. Who benefits financially. Who funds the work. Who has a commercial interest in the outcome. Without that context, the report cannot be taken at face value. Not because it is false, but because it is incomplete.

Black market gambling deserves exposure. Harm deserves attention. But when industry-funded organisations publish reports that directly benefit their funders, selective focus becomes unavoidable. You can call that activism. You can call it harm reduction. I call it a situation that deserves exactly the same scrutiny as the companies being criticised. Because when money, morality and market share line up too neatly, you should always ask one question. Who really benefits?

FAQs

What is the main focus of the MyStake report?
The report targets MyStake as an unlicensed operator in the UK, claiming to highlight black market gambling risks.

Who published the report on MyStake?
The report was published under GAMSR and Deal Me Out, led by Jordan Lea, presented as a public-interest initiative.

Why is Genting mentioned in relation to the report?
Genting provided funding to Deal Me Out, which raises questions about potential conflicts of interest given their market position.

Does funding from the gambling industry affect the report’s neutrality?
Yes, industry funding can create incentives that align the report with licensed operators’ interests rather than being fully independent.

What happens when a black market operator loses UK players?
Players migrate to licensed operators, which may financially benefit the white-market companies funding the report.

Why were sections of the report removed before publication?
Around 20% of the report was removed due to legal risk, though the content was submitted to regulators confidentially, raising ethical concerns.

Can the report be considered unbiased?
Not entirely. The report presents a single narrative focused on MyStake, omitting platform-level analysis and financial interests of white-market operators.

How do removed sections affect regulatory trust?
Regulators may question the report’s credibility since content deemed too risky for public release is still sent confidentially, creating transparency concerns.

What ethical issues arise from the report’s publication process?
The selective removal of content, combined with industry funding, suggests the report may prioritize protecting donors over fully informing the public.

Who ultimately benefits from the report’s findings?
Licensed operators and the gambling industry stand to gain from black-market displacement, while public-facing claims of harm reduction may mask these incentives.