President & CEO, Betsson
Gaming in the Nordics 2026 - The industry's perspective:Reflections, Pontus Lindwall & Birgitte Sand
About Pontus Lindwall
Pontus Lindwall, President and CEO of Betsson, spoke at an event titled "Gaming in the Nordics 2026" in Copenhagen on July 1, 2026. He discussed the regulatory landscape across five Nordic markets, describing them as "all in motion." Lindwall said he expects new regulation in Finland to take effect on July 1, 2027, and expressed hope that Finland would model its rules on Sweden and Denmark rather than Norway. He characterized Finland as "a monopoly in transition." Regarding Iceland, he stated that the country has "like 0% channelization" because no regulated online business currently operates there, though he noted that some Icelandic attendees had told him regulation is forthcoming. Lindwall also commented on other European markets. He said Betsson had been "forced to exit UK and Germany," describing the UK as having "cranked up the taxes" and Germany as having "over restriction." He argued that "good regulation is good business for players, society and operators alike" and stated that "channelization is the scoreboard" for evaluating regulated markets.
Transcript (53 segments)
H
Host0:00
Before we let Pontus go, we have a lovely person to join us on stage, which is Big Sand, the CEO of Big Sand and Associates. And for you all, if you have any questions, please feel free to ask them at the end of this segment. The floor is yours.
B
Big Sand0:24
Thank you. Hello everyone. Can you hear me? Yes. Lovely to see you now. I was having my back to you all. So, hello. And once again, thank you to BC for having all of us. It's lovely here. And Pont, I know you so well. And I've been a fan of that simple reason that you were one of our first licences back in 12.
P
Pontus Lindwall0:47
Yeah, thank you for that.
B
Big Sand0:49
And you're hanging on.
P
Pontus Lindwall0:50
Yeah, we're hanging in there. Yeah.
B
Big Sand0:52
Take that as a compliment.
P
Pontus Lindwall0:53
Yeah.
B
Big Sand0:54
For especially Anders and his team.
P
Pontus Lindwall0:57
So, that's great. We need operators to be licensed and stay on in the country, right?
B
Big Sand1:03
Yeah. So, we're going to reflect a little bit and ultimately it's about making all of us remember and reflect on what you just told us, right?
P
Pontus Lindwall1:14
Yeah, closer. Yeah. Or I can speak.
B
Big Sand1:19
So, we spoke about the Nordic country's five speeds.
P
Pontus Lindwall1:24
Yeah.
B
Big Sand1:24
And when you say something like that, it just Woo. It sounds so bad having five different speeds in such a small area in the world, right?
P
Pontus Lindwall1:37
Yeah.
B
Big Sand1:37
How does it look like for an operator to have these? I mean, you're used to different kind of speeds in Europe and everywhere. So, is it a special problem for you?
P
Pontus Lindwall1:45
I don't think it's a special problem, but I think we maybe we expected the Nordics to be a little bit more forward-leaning and being faster because we have adopted it and the infrastructure very early and as you said we have functioning states that know how to regulate. So it's a little bit, but so that's on the one hand. On the other hand, we know that all Nordic companies love their monopolies and that is what has been pulling them back. And I think Finland has struggled and wants to keep the monopoly as long as it can, but now it has to give up.
B
Big Sand2:28
Right, so now you touch upon monopoly is right and I'm not going to say any personal opinion on that one if I can help it. So fair competition. Do you see fair competition in the Nordic markets when you look at how the monopolies turned into sort of like still keeping part of their business a monopoly but also entering into a more liberalized part of the market? Are they acting fair and are they being treated fair by the regulator or more?
P
Pontus Lindwall2:59
I think the regulator and the state of course who is behind the regulator has arranged it in a way so that they can keep a fair part of the gaming industry for themselves being the lotteries, but there is no real protection reason for keeping the monopolies for lotteries and things like that because they don't show much of a gambling problem. So I think it's more for financial reasons and I think to answer the question, the competition is not really fair.
B
Big Sand3:36
Right. Right. So you also said that it takes a lot of cooperation between all the stakeholders in the ecosystem to really make it happen in a good way. Yeah.
P
Pontus Lindwall3:48
It's a balance how to strike the right balance. And so obviously by saying that one you also acknowledge your responsibility as a big operator, right.
B
Big Sand3:59
Yeah.
P
Pontus Lindwall3:59
Yeah.
We tried to communicate with the regulators and unfortunately I guess Finland regulator is not here today which is a little bit weird that when they are very close to releasing regulations and they are working on it as we speak. I know that why don't they go here to learn? I mean it's not that far from Helsinki to here.
B
Big Sand4:22
Right, and a piece of advice for Finland. I mean obviously we all of us in the room have a lot of experience. I can see very many experienced faces here. But at the same time it's easy to provide advice right when you're not in the very middle of it. So it's not always that regulators can share the reason behind a given legislation and a given way of regulating. But a piece of advice to fill in, what would that be?
P
Pontus Lindwall4:58
Piece of advice would be to as we said here channelization that is actually the measurement of success. So if you want to have a high channelization and I think you need to have a high channelization to have a sustainable gaming market, then you need to have the things in order: you need to have a decent tax level, you need to have a full-fledged product, and you need to have the possibility for the licensed operators to communicate to the market with restrictions of course, but there needs to be some way of doing marketing.
B
Big Sand5:33
So, Pontus, is it really hard work to have a dialogue with regulators in the Nordics? Is it hard?
P
Pontus Lindwall5:40
Yeah, it's hard work because Denmark stood out because we could speak and we could meet, but Sweden, they just closed the door and Finland did the same.
B
Big Sand5:50
Yeah. So, a piece of
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Pontus Lindwall5:52
Iceland don't even have one and Norway was hopeless. Hopeless.
B
Big Sand5:58
I think I struck something there. [laughter] So, really, what would you say has been your absolutely best experience with regulators? What is your favorite way of dealing with regulators? How do you want to be received and the cooperation between regulators and yourselves? What is the best way going forward?
P
Pontus Lindwall6:26
One way is to first, I guess regulators don't really love private gambling operators, but they have to admit to themselves that we are on the same side of the table because if we don't have any gambling going on on our license, then we don't have a business. So that's the first step to say we are on the same side of the table. If you are on the same side of the table, then you meet to discuss and exchange ideas and knowledge. And if you do that, then you have a good chance of making something good.
B
Big Sand7:00
And do you feel that you've done everything you could possibly do to prevent the illegal market from growing in the Nordics? Is it something that you together with fellow licensed operators could do more to fight against illegal gambling? The fight is on all of the shoulders that are out there in the legal market. Could you do more or are you actually?
P
Pontus Lindwall7:23
I think we do as good as we can, but given the situation we have to be sober enough to just say okay we see this happen and we understand why it's happening and we see former colleagues starting off companies like that because they work with us and they see the problems that we have. They see the problems with channelization and you mentioned about the value of the players that play on the unlicensed market. In Sweden, we have companies that we know about that tell us they have like 10 times higher value per player than we have in the regulated market and that shows the difference that these are the people that we need to bring back to the regulated markets.
B
Big Sand8:12
Yeah. Do you have a voice, Pontus, in the EU or with governments in the Nordics? Is it possible for a huge business like yours to actually get a voice straight to government to talk with ministers?
P
Pontus Lindwall8:29
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It is. Yeah. That's what I've done and that we did with the Swedish regulator before and after the regulation. So, and it was we were in talks straight with the minister that was running it.
B
Big Sand8:44
So, listening in on and talking about the big tech and the challenges really to stand united to actually move them in the right direction in a more efficient way. Can you support that initiative as well?
P
Pontus Lindwall8:57
Yeah, I think so. And I think it's a great idea to speak to the big tech companies and see what they can stop already at the source. It should be quite possible to find things with AI, you know, and instead of having someone on the Danish spit sitting and scrolling the whole internet to find sites, that's kind of an impossible job.
B
Big Sand9:20
So when you look at your own numbers for illegal markets in the Nordic compared to what we can all listen in on from the gambling authorities themselves or from H2 gambling capital or others, do they compare? Are your numbers higher when we talk about the legal market?
P
Pontus Lindwall9:40
No, actually we are quite, we are not that big in the Nordics, actually not even in Sweden where we come from. So it's hard for us to say, but I think it was very interesting to see that the trend on the Danish market that has been going up and down, but if you would make one straight line it has actually gone down a bit since it launched, and you can ask yourself what is the background of that.
B
Big Sand10:06
So I'm not going to, we have two minutes, I'm not going to really ask you to say it again, but which of the Nordic countries do you think is?
P
Pontus Lindwall10:16
No, she she she she wants a hug.
B
Big Sand10:19
I think Anders made it clear already. But apart from that, so looking at Europe as such, jurisdiction, favorite model.
P
Pontus Lindwall10:29
We're doing quite well in Italy, even though they have a more or less a marketing ban, but it's a quite liberal market and they allow both casino and sports. Taxation is okay. We like that market, but we like Denmark too and Sweden is not that bad. So now we hope that Finland will be up there with Denmark.
B
Big Sand10:55
Yeah.
P
Pontus Lindwall10:56
Up there with Denmark.
B
Big Sand10:58
Right? I think that was it for the two of us. So thank you so much, Pontus.
P
Pontus Lindwall11:02
Yes. Thank you.
B
Big Sand11:03
Thank you very much.
P
Pontus Lindwall11:03
Thank you very much.
B
Big Sand11:04
Please, please stay just a little while longer because there we may have some questions. Rory, please rate.
R
Rory11:36
Yeah, I think affiliate licensing could be good. I think in general restrictions that restrict marketing is not good for channelization. As I said, there will be some things that you will have to work, you will have to put in restrictions especially to prevent kids and things, but you will always have to have that balance that every little single restriction pushes the channelization downwards 1% or 2% and that makes a difference.
B
Big Sand12:16
Are there any other questions? There's your chance then.