Sweden’s gambling regulator, Spelinspektionen, has fined ice hockey team IF Björklöven with SEK 25,000 (£2k).

IF Björklöven falls under Spelinspektionen’s remit as it has a licence to provide lottery games for the period 15 March 2023 to 14 March 2028, through which it then funds its own activities. The violations in question, deemed “serious” by the regulator, are in breach of the Gambling Act’s provisions relating to internal restructuring.

The breaches were constituted in June of this year, when the team notified the gambling authority regarding the addition of a digital lottery to its offering. Spelinspektionen then noticed that IF Björklöven had new board and management members that were not previously disclosed.

Upon further investigation, the regulator found that this occurred undeclared on three separate occasions – one person was unaccounted for in 2023, two more in 2024, and eight in 2025, for a total of eleven changes.

Under Sweden’s Gambling Act, any licence holder that implements changes in its top-level corporate structure should notify the regulator within 14 days of the introduction. 

This is to ensure that the people in question comply with the gambling regulatory requirements, i.e. they have not been declared bankrupt or are not connected to any crime-related proceedings.

In terms of the SEK 21,000 fine, one of the factors that Spelinspektionen has based its decision on is the duration of the deficiencies. Given that they span multiple years, the regulator has determined that they are of a “serious nature”, as previously noted.

Another factor is the net turnover of the licensed company, which the regulator has taken the immediately preceding financial year (2024/25) as a basis for. For IF Björklöven, according to Spelinspektionen, this amounted to SEK 432,606 (£35k).

As per the Gambling Act, the penalty fee should be at least SEK 5,000 and not more than 10% of the licensee’s turnover, which set the maximum sum that the team could be fined with at SEK 43,260.