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SKS365 Group, the operating company of Italian bookmaker PlanetWin365, has been charged by the Italian Financial Police of corporate tax evasion totalling €124 million.
According to a statement by the Guardia di Finanza (GDF) of the Reggio Calabria region, a law enforcement body that handles financial crimes, SKS365 had failed to declare some €4 billion in taxable income between 2015 and 2016, derived from “carrying out gambling activities illegally in Italy”.
Italian Police claim to uncover a “sophisticated money-laundering network” utilized by three Mafia families. The so-called ‘Glassia’ investigation, which has been branded as Italy’s biggest anti-money laundering (AML) probe, found that the Mafia networks had knowingly used the services of Malta-licensed betting firms’ Planetwin365, Revolutionbet, Bet1128, Betaland and Enjoybet as money laundering vehicles.
The Police states that SKS365, the biggest bookmaker implicated in the scandal, has benefited from illegal gambling activities and must payback €6 million in regional taxes, €71 million in income taxes, combined with a further €47 million in corporation taxes.
However, the document issued by the GDF does not constitute the demand for payment. The operator has now 60 days to submit a rebuttal to the Italian tax authorities, which will then reach a conclusion on the sum, if any, that is owed.
SKS365 Group maintains that it had cooperated fully with the ‘Glassia’ investigation, and also underlines that the Glassia-related tax violations occurred under its previous owners, as the company was sold to Dutch private equity fund Ramphastos Investments in late 2016 for €150 million.
Over recent years, Malta has increasingly been at the centre of several investigations by Italian authorities. The country has been described as “ATM for the Italian mafia” by the Investigative Reporting Project Italy (IRPI). Last November, two men leading ‘Ndrangheta’ clans were arrested in Reggio Calabria on charges linked to Malta-based gaming firms. Both men were accused of money laundering, tax evasion, and operating unlicensed betting parlours.
