Melbourne football club probed over deal with crypto casino mogul

afr.com:

The Victorian government’s responsible gambling body is investigating soccer club Melbourne Victory after it signed a commercial deal with live-streaming site Kick, owned by Rich Lister and crypto casino mogul Ed Craven.

Kick, which was established in Melbourne last year, was founded by Mr Craven and his business partner, Bijan Tehrani, and is the main competitor to Amazon’s Twitch. Millions of users upload videos or provide commentary as they play video games and go about their daily lives.

Ed Craven (left) and Bijan Tehrani launched live streaming service Kick last year. Eamon Gallagher

But the platform prominently features streamers playing games on Mr Craven’s online casino, Stake.com, which critics say promotes gambling to children because under-18s are big users of live-streaming.

Melbourne Victory, which signed a deal with Kick this week, is a partner of the Victorian Responsible Gambling Foundation and pledged in 2019 to reject all gambling sponsorship.

“The foundation takes our Love the Game partnership agreements very seriously and is making appropriate inquiries with Melbourne Victory regarding this announcement,” a spokesman for the government-controlled body said.

Melbourne Victory, which is partly owned by Miami-based private equity group 777 Partners, joined the Victorian Responsible Gambling Foundation’s “love the game, not the odds” campaign in 2019. It pledged not to partner with gambling brands in a video that warned of the dangers of exposing children to gambling.

“The first generation of kids to grow up with gambling advertising is now the largest group of sports betters in Victoria,” a club player says in the video.

Melbourne Victory fans show their support during a February 2023 match at AAMI