A lawyer on regulation and what comes next

Throughout the last 16 and a half years, I’ve conducted hundreds—likely thousands—of interviews with professionals in the iGaming, blockchain, and frontier tech space. Nothing makes me happier than reconnecting with an interviewee from years ago, which is exactly what happened at ICE 2026, thanks to the crypto casino panel I moderated.

When we arrived on site for the panel, one of my speakers, Ron Segev, Founding Partner of Segev LLP, reminded me that we shot an interview together in Macau in 2018, which truly made my day. For those who don’t know, Segev LLP is a leading gaming and betting law firm, and Segev himself has been a specialized gaming and betting lawyer for nearly 20 years, representing some of the biggest names in the industry. He is also an exceptional panelist, and his opinion carries a lot of weight in the iGaming space, including where iGaming intersects with crypto and blockchain.

During our panel, we ran out of time and were unable to finish a debate on why the crypto casino black market exists in the first place. This is a juicy topic that deserves to be spotlighted, so I reached out to Segev for his thoughts on the subject after we returned from Barcelona. In this interview, he also covers how crypto casinos can position themselves for a pivot to the regulated space and how blockchain in general can improve iGaming operations.

Becky Liggero: It’s so nice to be reconnected, Ron. Thank you so much for taking the time to follow up on some of the content we touched on during our panel. Let’s start with the critical question we uncovered. Why does the crypto casino black market exist in the first place?

Ron Segev: Where regulation does not yet fully reflect how people transact or what products are permitted in regulated markets, gaps tend to emerge. Unregulated operators often operate in those gaps. The issue is less about the technology itself and more about timing, fragmentation, and the absence of regulated alternatives that align with existing consumer demand.

In this case, some consumers want to deposit in crypto, withdraw in crypto, and/or play in crypto. Some consumers want to play on verifiably fair on-chain platforms. Some consumers don’t want online casinos or sportsbook charges to show up on bank statements on credit cards for non-nefarious reasons (they might have a stigma around it). In these examples, we see a demand for a product and service that regulators are simply not regulating.

Of course, many black-market casinos exist for reasons that have more to do than simply offering a product that some consumers want. These black-market sites avoid hefty licensing and compliance costs, they avoid having to pay a share of gross gaming revenue as gaming tax or other regulatory fee, and they can accept payment by crypto, which reduces processing costs and avoids the need for traditional merchant banking, which brings along with it its own costs and compliance requirements. On the consumer side, some players prefer playing in crypto, which they may have not declared to tax authorities, or which the player doesn’t want to deposit in a bank account. For these reasons, the relative anonymity which crypto transactions can provide is an additional attraction to some of these players.

With respect to bringing the product market gap that exists in the regulated crypto casino market, if more regulators allowed operators to accept crypto deposits and allow for some on-chain gameplay, they would likely bring some of these black-market operators and players into the regulated market.

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Becky Liggero: Would you say early crypto adoption a liability or advantage for operators? What if they wish to pivot to the regulated market?

Ron Segev: Early crypto adoption can work either way. The key distinction is not whether crypto was used, but how it was implemented. Operators that approached crypto as financial infrastructure and built appropriate governance, controls, transaction monitoring, and compliance processes early on are generally better positioned to transition into regulated markets. Operators that relied on opacity or regulatory arbitrage often face more significant challenges when regulation matures.

The broader regulatory trend suggests that crypto is increasingly being brought into formal regulatory frameworks, which tends to favor operators that anticipated that direction and built accordingly. Recently, Draft Kings announced that it was rolling out crypto to cash deposit options for its players. The tide is turning.

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Becky Liggero: Great advice. Thank you. To be sure our readers are aware of the full potential, how do you see blockchain tech improving iGaming operations and user experience while running in the background?

Ron Segev: Blockchain tends to add the most value in iGaming when it functions primarily as payments or remittance infrastructure and for its smart contract capabilities. In the background, it can support more efficient settlement, stronger auditability, improved integrity controls, and more streamlined compliance reporting, without materially changing the player experience. From an operational perspective, the benefit lies in reducing friction, improving transparency, and supporting regulatory oversight.

When blockchain supports those outcomes quietly and predictably, regulators may accept its use, if not champion it. Smart contracts on blockchains have the power to fully automate near real-time data gathering and reporting for operators in an immutable, verifiable way. For example, if an operator were to put its deposit, payout, player fun segregation and bank reconciliation operations on the blockchain, smart contracts can be programmed to track how moneys flow through the operator’s system and generate automatic reports for regulators in near time.

These same smart contracts can provide automatic stops or holds on some of these operations and provide alerts to management if any element of the financial operation is nearing a risk threshold or non-compliant. The smart contracts can be programmed to report directly to regulators if regulators allowed such regimes to exist. One day soon, they may.

Becky Liggero: Let’s hope! Thank you so much, Ron. It’s been an absolute pleasure, and I look forward to catching up with you again soon.

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Watch: How do you build a successful ecosystem? Bring blockchain to the builders!