Redefining Financial Risk and Gambling Harm: Key Insights from iGB Live 2025

The iGB Live 2025 session featured Max Collinge, Head of Product at Yaspa, and Simo Dragicevic, Co-Founder of the Game Safety Institute, in a powerful conversation about financial data, open banking, and the future of player protection.

The Missed Opportunity in Open Banking

Open banking isn’t new. But despite its availability, the UK gambling industry has been slow to adopt it. According to Collinge, that’s largely due to the market being saturated with multiple financial innovations at once—Apple Pay, Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) platforms, and others competing for attention.

Yet in 2025, the numbers are shifting. One in five UK consumers now use open banking, and uptake is steadily growing. That growing familiarity presents a major opportunity for gambling operators and regulators.

So why does this matter for responsible gambling?

Because open banking provides real-time visibility into a player’s financial behavior—offering a far more holistic and timely picture than traditional checks.

New Insights into Gambling Behavior

Yaspa recently collaborated with major UK banks, including HSBC and Monzo, to explore how open banking data can reveal deeper insights into gambling harm. With consent from users, Yaspa analysed thousands of financial transactions to identify emerging risk patterns.

One major finding: players identified as high-risk were often gambling across multiple operators simultaneously, a behavior difficult for individual platforms to detect on their own.

While some operators have already integrated AI to detect irregular gambling patterns, Collinge argued that AI alone isn’t enough. Financial institutions, he said, must be part of the equation.

From Transactions to Intervention

In collaboration with the UK Gambling Commission, Yaspa is now working to turn these financial patterns into actionable safeguards. For example, if a player loses their job—something that might be indicated through transaction records or missed salary payments—this could trigger a red flag.

That data could then be shared (with proper permissions) with operators, allowing them to monitor whether the player’s gambling activity increases during a vulnerable period.

Importantly, Yaspa is also seeking to bridge the gap between subjective experience and objective behavior. The idea is to ask players directly if they feel they are experiencing gambling harm, and then compare their responses with their financial data. This multi-dimensional model could lead to smarter, more personalized intervention strategies.

Yaspa aims to release its findings from this ongoing research in the second half of 2025.

Trust as a Prerequisite for Data Sharing

However, accessing this kind of sensitive data depends heavily on one factor: trust.

Operators are already under pressure to carry out affordability checks and comply with anti-money laundering (AML) and counter-terrorism financing (CTF) regulations. Credit bureau checks are also being discussed by regulators.

But Collinge emphasized that open banking can support all these requirements with minimal disruption to the user experience.

Currently, when players are asked to upload bank statements manually, only 10–15% comply. In contrast, when given the option to connect their account via open banking, the adoption rate can increase to as much as 40%. That shift not only improves compliance—it also enhances the quality of data being collected.

A New Player Lifecycle Model

This kind of frictionless integration has the potential to transform the player lifecycle. From onboarding to ongoing monitoring, operators can gain a deeper understanding of each customer’s financial wellbeing.

Still, not all operators may be ready to adopt this level of transparency. Some may see it as too invasive or complex to manage. But for Dragicevic and Collinge, that resistance is short-sighted.

Those who embrace open banking early will likely find themselves better aligned with emerging regulatory expectations and better equipped to support players responsibly.

Industry Momentum and Investment

Yaspa’s vision has also attracted investor confidence. The company recently closed a £12 million Series A funding round, led by Discerning Capital—the same group that backed eSports betting platform Midnite. This level of funding signals growing interest in solutions that address not just revenue growth, but sustainable, responsible player engagement.

As financial and gambling ecosystems become more interconnected, the role of shared data and collaborative oversight is only set to grow. Yaspa’s work stands at the intersection of that shift, and iGB Live 2025 made it clear: the future of responsible gambling depends on early detection, smarter data use, and cross-industry cooperation.

Read Also: Claire Williams Opens iGB Live 2025 with F1-Inspired Lessons for the iGaming Industry