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About Wild West Wilds
Raja’s appetite for high-stakes gambling predates his emergence as a prominent property lender. The Times reported last month that he was declared bankrupt in March 2005 with debts totaling around £350,000 ($470,000), a portion of which was owed to casino operators.
His bankruptcy was discharged a year later, though he remained subject to bankruptcy restrictions until March 2009. MFS was incorporated in November 2006 by Pratibha Dewan, who later became Raja’s wife.
Raja, who has publicly described himself as the company’s founder, did not formally become a registered director until 2017.
How to play Wild West Wilds
But that isn’t the case according to Richards: “We are not signalling plans to re-enter B2C elsewhere; Africa is a distinct case: a high-growth, underpenetrated region where owning a local operator makes strategic sense in a way it may not elsewhere.”
There’s also a financial constraint, with Ahlberg noting that GiG has used its available cash and is raising additional capital to fund the 888Africa transaction, meaning he doesn’t expect the company to pursue further B2C acquisitions in the short term.
Robinson takes a more expansive view, however, arguing that the acquisition could mark the beginning of a broader shift in GiG’s strategy. “I’d read it as the start of something, not a one-off,” he says. “GiG’s survival as an independent business depends on consolidating in emerging markets where it can own the P&L, not just supply the technology.
What is Wild West Wilds?
By comparison, the long tail of smaller black market sites rely heavily on affiliates to generate traffic.
Much of the onus for the increasing black market is put on increasingly restrictive policies enforced by regulators across the licensed sector.
Taking a deeper look at these restrictive driving black market activity, up to 46% of the markets covered in the report enforced “significant advertising restrictions” on the regulated market, including in Belgium, Bulgaria, Coratia, Cyprus, Germany, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Montenegro, the Netherlands, Poland, Romania and Spain.
