Weekly digest: bank account blocks, marketplace cards, Belarus casino ownership, Pin-Up booth costs, and new PlayCity fines

This week’s posts in PHR were mostly about payment rails getting tighter, not looser: Russian banks are blocking accounts more aggressively under 115-FZ and 161-FZ, marketplace cards are getting caught in the same dragnet, and regulators in Ukraine are still handing out fines. For high-risk PSPs, the practical question is simple: which payment instruments are still holding, and which ones are starting to fail on contact with compliance.

1. Banks have become more aggressive about blocking accounts for transfers under 115-FZ and 161-FZ. Since 1 September, the number of account blocks has increased several times, and the source says the trend is only getting worse.
2. One of the posts looked at who owns casinos in Belarus. For operators and payment partners, that kind of ownership mapping matters because counterparties, licensing ties, and jurisdictional exposure are often the real story behind a merchant profile.
3. Another post broke down the cost of building the Pin-Up booth for the Punin-era Pin-Up brand. The figure cited is around $1 million, and the post explained how that budget is put together.
4. Marketplace cards are being hit as well: 115-FZ has reached cards linked to Wildberries, Ozon, ЦУПИС, and other products that were previously treated as “safe.” In practice, that means the old assumption that marketplace or quasi-marketplace cards sit outside enhanced scrutiny is no longer working.
5. Ukraine’s PlayCity issued another round of fines. The posts said blogger Bogdan Shelyudiak was fined 5.2 million UAH, while GorillaBet received a 432k UAH fine.