Sharp rise in reports of suspicious sports betting in Switzerland

Sharp increase in reports of suspicious sports betting Keystone-SDA

Last year the Intercantonal Gambling Supervisory Authority received 184 reports of suspicious activities in connection with 166 sports competitions.

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This represents a sharp increase on 2023, when there were 107 reports from 92 competitions.

The Intercantonal Gambling Supervisory Authority (Gespa) announced on Tuesday that an improved exchange of information, particularly on an international level, had contributed to the higher number of reports. Once again, the majority of reports related to football, which also generates by far the largest betting volumes. The number of reports relating to football almost doubled compared to 2023, from 74 to 140 reports.

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The reasons for this increase cannot be determined with certainty, the report continued. One obvious reason is the quantitative and qualitative improvement in communication within the Group of Copenhagen, the network of national platforms. Football receives increased attention due to its importance on the betting market, and an optimised exchange of information leads to significantly more reports.

Gespa wrote that the next few years will show whether this is a sustainable development or an outlier. The figures for the other sports are once again very low and do not allow any conclusions to be drawn about possible trends.

Reports with a clear link to Switzerland are still rare. In the 2024 reporting year, Gespa reported two cases to the prosecution authorities in order to clarify whether any criminal offences were committed in Switzerland. These cases involved anomalies on the betting market or conspicuous bets on competitions that took place abroad. Once again, there were no convictions for match-fixing in Switzerland in 2024.

Translated from German by DeepL/ts

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