MGA-Licensed Operator Linked To €5.86 Billion German Illegal Gambling Probe

An MGA-licensed company is allegedly at the centre of a €5.86 billion illegal gambling operation in Germany, a new investigation series, #casinosecrets, has uncovered.

The investigation, by Lilith Wittmann, Follow the Money, SVT, NDR, and NRK, places Platincasino and its owner, Thomas Kalman, at the centre of the billion-euro illegal online gambling probe.

Kalman’s lawyer, Nik Sarafi, told Wittmann the accusations were baseless. Kalman has not been charged with a crime.

The Frankfurt public prosecutor’s office has confirmed that more than 100 officers searched 11 properties on 8th September, mainly in Frankfurt and the surrounding Rhine-Main region. 

Five people are accused of offering online gambling commercially and as an organised group, without the required German licence, since at least July 2021. Prosecutors allege that about €5.86 billion was staked between July 2021 and the end of 2023. They also allege that the company did not pay gambling taxes in full or at all, and put the tax loss for 2024 alone at about €77.6 million. A Frankfurt district court issued the arrest warrant for the main suspect.

Prosecutors have not named the suspect. However, on 17th September, the Joint Gambling Authority of the German Federal States (GGL) welcomed the arrests linked to a €5.86 billion illegal gambling operation between July 2021 and the end of 2023. In that statement, the GGL explicitly warned consumers against participating in illegal offers such as Platincasino.

The investigation notes that the details of the Frankfurt arrest, including the figures and place of residence, match Kalman’s. 

Platincasino appeared online around 2014. From November 2017, the casino was associated with the Maltese company Red Rhino Limited, which held a Malta Gaming Authority licence. 

Archived versions of the site from 30th November 2017 identified the operator as Red Rhino Limited, a Maltese company holding MGA licence MGA/CL1/1364/2017. The latest known licence issued to Red Rhino was MGA/B2C/398/2017 and has been surrendered.

Maltese company records list Red Rhino’s parent company as Lazy Ape Holding Limited. The Malta Business Registry lists ARX Trustees Limited as the shareholder.

Documents seen by journalists from a leak of the MGA records that Wittmann conducted show Thomas Kalman, a Frankfurt-based entrepreneur, as Red Rhino’s sole ultimate beneficial owner.

According to the MBR UBO registry,  Thomas Kalman is the 100% owner of Red Rhino and the other companies. The companies have since changed their names. Red Rhino Limited changed its name to Rursus Inc Ltd in October 2025. Lazy Ape changed its name to Praestator Tech Ltd in November 2025. 

The reporters claim the companies fall under The Multiple Group brand, which has no matching company in the Maltese register and no EU trademark. The brand was used by employees, on social-media accounts, and at company events.

The investigation states that it handles Platincasino’s Zendesk support logins and advertises for German-speaking casino support staff in Malta. Those listings were live until September 2026. It also says that its current Facebook page is the former Red Rhino. The article says Kalman appears in its company-party videos from 2024 and spring 2026.

Germany’s new gambling law took effect in July 2021, allowing online casinos to obtain a German licence for the first time. The article notes that Kalman’s companies applied and were rejected. A bank statement filed in the Maltese company register shows that Red Rhino paid about €5.64 million to the Frankfurt tax office for German virtual slot machine tax for October 2022

In August 2023, a “Platincasino.com Database Migration Plan” was submitted to the MGA, setting 4 October 2023 as the date for transferring the casino’s player database.

The brand, domains and player data were later sold to Latiform BV, a company in Curaçao. Financial statements reportedly show that it paid €6 million for them.

The reporters say the gambling and betting licensing process has serious systemic issues.

Jetzt, an Austrian publication that partnered in the investigation, traced how former MGA head Mario Galea embedded himself in Curaçao’s regulatory framework. 

According to the article, Galea, on behalf of his company called Random Consulting, fielded gambling industry representatives’ questions at the Hilton Hotel in St Julian’s in November 2024. This was the SiGMA summit, one of Malta’s key industry events. 

According to Jetzt, Galea complained on the podium about ‘weak’ applications and ‘fake’ domains. In response to Jetzt reporters’ questions, Galea said his company was just a contractor supporting Curaçao’s authorities with ‘fact-finding’, and the ultimate decisions about licensing were fully in the hands of the responsible Curaçao authority.

In 2025, Galea was honoured in the SiGMA Euro-Med awards for his role in developing Malta’s early gambling regulations.

The case lands in the middle of a long-running dispute between Malta and Germany over MGA-licensed operators serving German players.

In 2023, Parliament passed Bill 55, adding Article 56A to the Gaming Act. The provision allows Maltese courts to refuse to recognise foreign judgments against Malta-licensed operators for activity that is lawful under Maltese law. German players have sued Malta-licensed operators to recover their losses, and critics have said the provision shields operators from such claims.