Santa Hopper

What is Santa Hopper?

Application providers, digital platforms, hosting services and media intermediaries must remove irregular advertisements and campaigns after notification from the competent authority. The rapporteur’s version requires that the notification clearly and specifically identifies any content deemed irregular and ensures the right to a fair hearing and full defence. Journalistic, academic, parliamentary, artistic and opinion content are expressly protected. 

Operators and companies linked to them are also prohibited from acquiring, licensing, or exploiting rights to sporting events held in the country. In the area of ​​administrative penalties, the rapporteur’s text incorporates the new infractions into the existing sanctions system in Law 14.790 of 2023, which provides for fines of up to BRL2 billion ($392.8 million). 

One of the main changes made by Vieira is the creation of the crime of promoting unauthorised betting operators. The penalty is one to five years imprisonment. This may be increased by one-sixth to two-thirds when the promotion is done by a digital influencer, athlete, or well-known person, due to their greater ability to reach the public. 

About Santa Hopper

“Here’s an API. Bernard and 88 other people can market-make all these request-for-quotes (RFQs),” Marantelli says. “Some people might come in and just do esports because they’re esports experts. Others do everything. Some focus on same-game parlays. But it’s a sportsbook.”

The institutional layer is largely invisible to customers presented with a P2P proposition. Retail users may technically trade against one another, but the depth required by a mass-market product cannot be supplied by occasional customers alone. Professional firms must be prepared to quote continuously and commit substantial capital.

Marantelli says the London-based White Swan is a significant market maker on several secondary exchanges, accounting for as much as 40% of activity on some platforms. Its particular focus is the RFQ, parlay market.

How to play Santa Hopper

The same intelligence can be useful to gambling companies and suppliers that want to monitor where their products are appearing. Madsen says Trace2Trace currently has a client that fits that description, although he cannot disclose its identity.

Madsen is clear that Trace2Trace does not shut websites down. Instead it tracks domains, identifies connections and documents changes so that regulators, enforcement authorities or other customers can use the information.

That distinction also informs his view of the wider battle. Asked whether illegal gambling can actually be defeated, his answer is: “No, but you can make it very difficult for them.”