In Chile, 15 the 16 First Division clubs display some type of betting house advertising. In addition, the Ascenso tournament (Serie B) bears the name of a company in the field. Colo Colo has Betsson up his sleeve and from next year it will have Coolbet, a bookmaker with which it signed a two-year agreement for US$ 6 million to be the main sponsor of the “Cacique”.
For its part, Curicó Unido has Juega en Línea on its shoulders and Audax Italiano has Betway on its back. The latter company also has a large presence in Ñublense, Everton, Unión La Calera and Coquimbo.
Betano is another of the bookmakers that has a presence in Chilean football thanks to Universidad de Chile and Club Deportes La Serena. Finally, O'Higgins is sponsored by Latamwin. UC also has Coolbet as a minor sponsor, so Juan Tagle is critical of the bill promoted by the Ministry of Sports.
"It seems good to me to regulate the tax issue and the access of minors to online betting, but not prohibit them as sponsors. Cutting off an important source of football financing goes in the opposite direction," he told the local newspaper El Mercurio.
According to him, the background is for another reason: "There is a strong lobby of the casinos against the bookmakers. I say this because they have contacted me. And the lobby of the casino industry is not because they are worried about the health of the population because of the risk of gambling addiction, but because online betting houses affect their business. That's why the lobby is so big."
Tagle criticizes the political class for promoting a rule that prohibits advertising on jerseys, stadiums and sporting events. “Not only because of the project of the previous government. Now, the Ministry of Sport has come out saying that online betting houses are illegal,” he claims.
“Yes, there are values involved here such as avoiding gambling or tax evasion, two interesting issues to regulate, but qualifying online betting as illegal per se I do not agree, among other things, because they are businesses located outside of Chile. Prohibiting these sponsors to sport, which has such difficulty in obtaining financing, seems regrettable to me. It can be regulated, but why punish football and sports?”, says the top leader of the company that manages Universidad Católica.
The progress of the projects
The first bill to address the explosive irruption of online betting houses in Chile was sent to Congress in March by the Ministry of Finance of the government of Sebastián Piñera, a few days before the change of command. In essence, it intends to put limits on a market that moves US$170 million a year in Chile but is still awaiting legalization.
The initiative, in addition to collecting US$50 million annually in taxes, seeks to ban the advertising of these multinationals on jerseys, events and sports clubs to reduce the population's exposure to gambling. Also, reduce security problems with credit or debit cards used for gambling.
The bill was filed in the Chamber's Economy Commission, and since June of this year another has been processed in the Sports Commission that, in practice, reinforces the prohibition of advertising in clubs. On Tuesday (12), in fact, it was approved in general, an occasion in which the Ministry of Sport (Mindep) described bookmakers as 'illegal'.
The clubs defend their resources
The U and Colo Colo defend themselves by pointing out that in Europe different countries allow it. "In European leagues, more than 50% of the teams are sponsored by bookmakers," said Alfredo Stöhwing, president of Blanco y Negro, the company that controls Colo Colo.
"This contract is similar to the one that clubs like Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bielsa’s Leeds and PSG have," Michael Clark, head of Azul Azul, responded last January to justify a commercial agreement that doubles the money of the previous main sponsor.
Asked about the case of the Spanish market that banned all advertising on football teams in August - today no club has that type of sponsorship - Tagle retorted: "But the level of income that Spanish clubs have and the contribution that the State makes to sport there it is very different from Chile.”
Since the law came into force, sponsorship has practically disappeared from football clubs (it fell by 87% in the last quarter of 2021) and the little one still present is directed to a market that is not Spanish and that cannot be regulated, nor therefore prohibited, explain from the Ministry of Consumption of the Government of Spain.
Source: GMB
