Lady Lava

What is Lady Lava?

“Japan is acting cautiously, after observing missteps from other jurisdictions. They are proceeding in the way that best suits them,” she adds.

The factor that led some operators to drop out of the licensing race could be the “uncertainty” created by regulations that “didn’t seem set in stone”, says Leckert.

“Some of them [investors] that were looking at Japan were looking at a big IR licence or nothing. With Tokyo and Yokohama being out of the mix, maybe some weren’t as interested anymore and decided to sit back, and wait and see how regulation and licensing shake out.”

What is Lady Lava?

Egypt’s gambling rules were written around physical venues. Law 8 of 2022 provides that “gambling games may not be practised in establishments except by non-Egyptians”. No licensing framework exists for online betting.

In October 2024 the then-prosecutor general ordered the freezing of e-wallets and the suspension of mobile lines used by betting agents. Separately, in February this year, officials said regulators were working with the telecoms authority and the media council towards blocking about 80% of betting applications by the end of that month.

Ahmed Badawi, who chairs the House communications committee, said in May that the government would amend the anti-cybercrime law to name online betting explicitly. Life imprisonment was discussed for the gravest offences. No bill number or text has been published.

What is Lady Lava?

The report underscored gambling harm as a significant public health concern. It cited the Gambling Commission’s Gambling Survey for Great Britain (GSGB), which has indicated that between one and 1.5 million adults in Great Britain now score high enough on the Problem Gambling Severity Index (PGSI) rangeto indicate problem gambling. 

According to the system used to rank players on the PGSI, a score of 0 or between 1 and 3 is considered low-risk, while scoring between 3 and 7 suggests moderate risk, and a score of 8 or higher represents problem gambling.

Although many industry commentators have pushed back against the GSGB and methods used in the survey to determine the scale of problem gambling in the UK.