Michigan Targets 10 Offshore Casino Sites With Cease-and-Desist Orders
Michigan continues to send out monthly Cease and Desist letters to both offshore and sweepstake casino operators.
Michigan Continues its battle with unlicensed casinos. © Brad Switzer, Unsplash
Key Facts:
- The Michigan Control Board issued a Cease and Desist Letter to Apex Dynamics
- The Belize-based company operated ten unlicensed casinos in the State
- Apex will have 14 days to exit Michigan or face criminal penalties
The Wolverine state didn’t stop fighting with unlicensed offshore casino operator Apex Dynamics. This week, the Michigan Gaming Control Board issued a cease-and-desist letter to all ten of the company’s casinos.
Michigan is one of seven states where online gambling is legal, but operators must apply and be granted a license, pass a stringent background check, and pay state taxes.
Operating a casino without a license in Michigan is punishable by up to ten years in prison and a $100,000 fine.
The Gaming Control Board minced few words in asserting that the company had committed numerous violations not just of the Michigan Penal Code but also of the state’s Lawful Internet Gaming Act and the Michigan Gaming Control and Revenue Act.
We will continue to take strong action to shut down illegal operations that undermine trust in Michigan’s legal gaming system.– Henry Williams /MGCB Executive Director, Executive Director, MGCB Press Release
While many other offshore companies continue to operate unlicensed casinos in the state, some of the Control Board’s ire may have been drawn by what their press release calls “restrictive withdrawal conditions,” stating that players would need to wager many times their deposit before they would be allowed to withdraw funds. A quick look at the named casinos indicates the need for a 50x playthrough.
Those casinos named by the state include:
- Slotter Casino
- ReelSpin Casino
- Manhattan Slots Casino
- Lucky Red Casino
- High Noon Casino
- CryptoReels
- Club World Casinos
- Buzz Luck
- All Star Slots
- Aladdin’s Gold Casino
Online betting through licensed state operators has been live since January 2021 throughout Michigan. There is a $50,000 application fee, a $50,000 yearly renewal fee, and $100,000 for the initial license. The state then taxes revenue at 20% if you make less than $4 million in revenue, all the way to 28% if your revenue comes in at over $12 million.
Gambling in the State by the Numbers
The American Gaming Association estimates that illegal betting in the United States costs over $500 billion a year, with a large portion of that going to unlicensed offshore operators. They also estimate that about $13 billion in lost tax revenues occur every year.
So, it behooves Michigan to force out as many of these illegal casinos as possible. In February, they took action against nine other unlicensed and unregulated offshore casinos, and one would certainly expect that next month, they will move against more in what has become a game of whack-a-mole.
Still, Michigan’s licensed online casino and sportsbook operators generated $2.4 billion in revenue in 2024 and another $460 million through legal online sportsbooks, so the MGCB has many reasons to keep trying to control these untaxed gaming parlors—466 million reasons. That’s exactly what licensed operators contributed to state taxes last year
