Second Strike

About Second Strike

The report identifies land-based and online casinos and sports betting as carrying the highest money laundering exposure. By contrast, lotteries and scratchcards present lower risk. 

It finds that online gaming shows more documented terrorist financing activity than gambling, although proliferation financing risks remain limited across both sectors.

Cash, e-wallets, mobile money and virtual assets emerge as the payment methods most vulnerable to abuse. This is particularly true where operators use them to structure deposits below reporting thresholds. 

What is Second Strike?

“We think investors will be looking for signs that Genius can leverage Legend’s relationship to capture a larger share of the rapidly expanding sports betting and prediction market opportunity,” he aded in a note this week.

Genius founder and CEO Mark Locke this week touted Genius’ position as a provider of official data, settlement and integrity services to both traditional betting and predictions platforms.

“Through Legend and our wider media platform we help operators acquire the customers all of them are competing for,” he added in a personal LinkedIn post.

How to play Second Strike

Atucha praises the regulation and the regulators themselves for making entry into the market easy, as well as allowing them to be competitive against illegal operators. But the market hasn’t been without its challenges.

A 1% selective consumption tax (ISC) on the value of every online bet has been in force since 1 July 2025, after the original policy was scrapped from proposed regulations in July 2021.

Atucha warns that regulations are often perceived as operator-friendly at the start before governments begin looking to squeeze licensed sectors, likening the process to “boiling a frog”. He has observed similar scenarios in other LatAm markets, with tax increases occurring in Brazil, Colombia and Mexico in the last couple of years.