Investigation: payments for illegal casinos flowed through 24 Estonian companies with Latvian owners

A joint investigation by Latvian Radio’s Atvērtie faili and the Estonian newspaper Äripäev says a network of at least 24 Estonia-registered companies, owned or managed by Latvian residents, was used to launder revenue from gray iGaming. For PSPs and acquirers, the interesting bit is the familiar one: activity codes were manipulated so gambling money looked like ordinary commerce.

1. According to the journalists, the structure relied on ordinary Latvian residents acting as formal owners, often for a few hundred euros. A acquaintance or relative would arrange a power of attorney with a Latvian notary, an Estonian citizen would register the company, and day-to-day coordination then moved to Telegram. Several of the nominal owners said they had no idea their firms were tied to money laundering.
2. The Estonian registration angle mattered because it was fast and remote: company formation can take a few days and does not require personal presence. Out of roughly 20 powers of attorney used in the scheme, 13 were notarized by the same notary. She said nothing looked suspicious, noting that over two and a half years her office had processed more than 3500 similar documents.
3. The key payments trick was simple and very familiar to anyone who has dealt with high-risk onboarding: when opening accounts, the companies declared business codes related to IT or trade instead of the gambling-specific MCC 7995. That meant player deposits could pass through the system as if they were normal purchases, rather than casino or betting transactions.
4. The investigation says Latvian fintech company Fyst, later renamed Fyst Tech, supplied newly created companies for one payment institution. The company’s beneficiary is listed as French citizen Jérémie Godreche. Lawyer Andrey Nikiforov, speaking for the company, denied any link to the Estonian firms or gambling operators and said Fyst Tech never provided intermediary or payment services.
5. The reporters also traced funds through Estonian companies Nobimatica and Webstorm, with accounts opened at Latvia’s Industra Bank. Player money landed there in 2021 and was then transferred to the Estonian electronic money institution Muvon. The bank and Latvia’s Financial Intelligence Service declined to comment on the substance, citing legal limits on disclosure about clients.

For market context, the Latvian Association of Operators estimated the country’s legal online gambling market at about €171 million in 2025, while the illegal market was around €62 million. That is the kind of gap that keeps compliance teams busy and explains why payment chains built on wrong MCCs, shell company stacks, and cross-border account opening keep showing up in the same old places.