Bottom Dollar: The Problems With 1xBet in Tennis
On the shady practices of 1xBet, and its rapidly growing presence across tennis.
In the months that I’ve been home since the U.S. Open, I’ve been catching up on my media consumption, both for fun—go see One Battle After Another while it’s still in theaters if you can—and also with a professional eye toward understanding what’s working best right now in the sports and journalism categories.
One of my favorites lately has been Pablo Torre’s podcast Pablo Torre Finds Out, which has been crushing it. The show broke and stayed in front of the massive scandal around apparent salary cap circumvention committed by the Los Angeles Clippers and their mega-billionaire owner Steve Ballmer.
The heart of the scandal is contracts which uncharismatic Clippers star Kawhi Leonard received from a company called Aspiration, a major sponsor of the team, that totaled a staggering $48 million but required no actual endorsements or work from Leonard—a seeming attempt to get around the NBA’s salary cap rules. Ballmer had personally put $50 million into Aspiration, and other payments from Clippers personnel also trickled in near Leonard’s scheduled paydays.
As the NBA gets an independent investigation underway, Ballmer’s defenders—including Ballmer himself—are saying that he was merely an unwitting victim of shady practices by this business, Aspiration, which itself is now bankrupt and facing various federal investigations and charges. There are also questions about how much the NBA itself knew about Aspiration during its major sponsorship relationship with the Clippers and throughout its eventual—and spectacularly rapid—demise.
Aside from wanting to recommend PTFO’s ongoing coverage of this saga to y’all—start here with the September 3 episode on YouTube or in your podcast app if you prefer audio, which is how I’ve been consuming it—I have been thinking about some of the issues in the NBA/Clippers/Aspiration/Leonard mess as I worked on today’s piece for Bounces.
Because how much responsibility or diligence should a sporting organization be expected to have when it comes to forming a partnership with a company? In the case of at least three separate tennis entities who partnered with the company discussed below, there doesn’t seem to have been any concern about bringing on board one of the most obviously shady sports entities I’ve ever come across. And the shadiness only continued once 1xBet began in tennis this year: among the things you’ll read about here are a possibly imaginary spokesman, a falsified quote attributed to the ATP, and player images used on betting websites without their knowledge or consent.
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Meet 1xBet
I hadn’t paid close attention to 1xBet—a company not legally allowed to operate in the United States, Australia, and most of Europe—until last month, when a follower on Bluesky flagged that they had signed a new sponsorship deal with the ATP Challenger Tour.
I will get into the unusual way this newest partnership was (barely) announced later, but first, let’s get to know 1xBet, since I imagine most readers aren’t familiar with it, either.
I do lots of original reporting here on Bounces, but for this post I want to emphasize that nearly everything in this background section has already been reported on, in some form, elsewhere. The tennis entities who have signed on with 1xBet should have been plenty aware of everything in this article; much of it is mentioned on 1xBet’s short Wikipedia page or even in Google AI summaries about the company. Two of the best dives into 1xBet I read, which I also encourage you to read, were by Bellingcat and Follow the Money.
1xBet is a sports betting company and online casino, founded in 2007 by three Russian men: Roman Smiokhin, Dmitri Kazorin, and Sergey Kashkov. The company was started in Bryansk, in Western Russia, near the borders with Belarus and Ukraine. In 2020, Russian authorities put out an arrest warrant for the founders; by that time, they had moved to Limassol, Cyprus.
1xBet is now officially registered in Curaçao. This relocation to the self-governing Dutch island Curaçao—where 1xBet doesn’t have any real offices or headquarters, just legal incorporation under what is known as a “letterbox firm”—is emblematic of the shadowy and elusive way that 1xBet does business. Follow the Money’s article includes discussion with a Curaçao-based lawyer who has represented a group of customers trying to recoup losses from the company. 1xBet simply never responded to the lawsuit, had its Curaçao-based parent company go bankrupt, and then immediately sprung up under a new Curaçao-based parent company.
“Grey market” is a phrase commonly used to describe the space in which 1xBet operates: they still conduct business in many countries in which they are not legally licensed to do so. Even in countries where sports betting is legal, 1xBet is rarely licensed to operate. But away from the hassles of rules and regulations, 1xBet has made considerable green in that grey. “Analysts agree that 1xBet has a multi-billion-dollar turnover and is one of the largest (if not the largest) online casinos in the world,” Follow the Money wrote in 2023. Sports Illustrated agreed that same year: “1xBet is probably the biggest sportsbook on the planet.”
Some of the earliest scrutiny of 1xBet that I found came in 2019, when a report by The Sunday Times of London discussed some of 1xBet’s practices, such as running online casino games featuring topless croupiers and offering betting on children’s sports and cockfighting. Within a month of that report, three English Premier League teams—Chelsea, Liverpool, and Tottenham Hotspur—ended their affiliations with 1xBet.
As 1xBet became blacklisted and blocked across nearly all of Europe, the company began shifting its attention to the Global South; on LinkedIn, no country has more than 20 individual profiles listing affiliation with 1xBet, but the most common countries are Bangladesh, Somalia, India, and Cameroon. The company has hired celebrities from places like Myanmar and the Democratic Republic of Congo as local spokesmen. 1xBet also uses illicit methods for attracting online attention in these countries. Their website in India, for instance, offers pirated Hollywood movies “with the 1xBet logo burnt in.”
Like many other websites of dubious legality, 1xBet also frequently changes its URLs. Rather than all running through some central domain—like google.com, amazon.com, cnn.com—1xBet tries to outrun authorities by operating under shifting addresses like 1xbetjap.com, or garbled URLs like “1xlite-05106.bar”
One of 1xBet’s strangest business practices is that it stages its own sporting events—if they can even be called that. As detailed by Bellingcat, 1xBet runs constant, lifeless short-format games played by amateurs, streamed via webcams onto the 1xBet website for the most desperate of gamblers. All sorts of sports are played by these sad-looking athletes; the most surreal and low-effort might be a form of seated soccer, shot by an overhead camera. Between “matches” the men change shirts to become new “teams”.
The above video is from Bellingcat, and if this dystopian form of sports content intrigues you, there’s more of it at their article.
Despite all this, 1xBet maintained a foothold in legitimate sports, led by its sponsorship deals with powerhouse soccer clubs FC Barcelona and Paris Saint-Germain.
Most conversations about “sportswashing” involve accusations that leagues, events, or athletes are being used to clean up the reputation of a country—most frequently Saudi Arabia. Here, the sportwashing is happening in a different direction: these major sporting brands have been paid to clean up 1xBet, a very dirty company which seems to face no consequences or accountability.
And this year, professional tennis started getting in on the act.
Dallas Open
The first of the tennis properties to announce a sponsorship deal with 1xBet in 2025 was the Dallas Open, an ATP 500-level event held in Frisco, Texas in February.
The partnership was announced midway through this year’s tournament, which is owned and operated by GF Sports and Entertainment and staged in the Dallas Cowboys’ massive indoor practice facility.
From the February 5 press release on the tournament’s website:
GF Sports and Entertainment has announced a multi-year partnership with 1XBET as the Official Betting Partner of the Dallas Open. This collaboration will bring innovative virtual branding to the tournament’s broadcast feed, enhancing the viewing experience for tennis fans.
1XBET has an extensive sponsorship portfolio across the world, including FC Barcelona, Paris Saint-Germain, LOSC Lille, CAF, Italian Serie A, Volleyball World & FIBA. Their award-winning website has over 3 million players visit monthly.
The Dallas Open begins this week in Frisco, TX. This marks its first year as an ATP 500 event. It will be the only ATP Tour indoor championship in the United States and features the top men’s tennis players in singles and doubles competition.
“We are excited to partner with 1XBET, a globally recognized brand in the sports betting industry,” said Jason Mackey, VP of Business Development at GF Sports & Entertainment. “This partnership not only enhances our broadcast but also aligns with our commitment to delivering a top-tier experience for our fans and players.”
“The partnership with Dallas Open was another milestone in the history of 1XBET. Collaborating with an ATP 500 event represents a strategically important step that opens new opportunities for promoting the 1XBET brand worldwide,” said a 1XBET representative.
Though the Dallas Open is not a particularly well-known brand name—even within the world of tennis, really, since it has only been on the calendar since 2022 and and only operates one week out of the year—its logo appears prominently on the various versions of homepages 1xBet uses around the world, alongside sports properties with much broader reaches.
Perhaps 1xBet sees particular clout in having an American brand endorse its product, since the Dallas Open is the only U.S.-based sports organization among its listed partners. It is, of course, very strange that an American tournament would make a deal with a company that is not legally allowed to operate in the United States.
I believe the “virtual” nature of this sponsorship means that the logo might’ve only appeared on certain Dallas Open broadcasts, but I am not 100 percent sure, and the tournament did not wish to clarify or elucidate.
“Respectfully our company does not want to comment at this time,” Dallas Open tournament director Peter Lebedevs told Bounces when asked for comment on its 1xBet partnership.
The 1xBet website does include a brief statement on its own website about the deal: it says the sponsorship covers every territory but the United States, and runs through Feb. 9, 2026—an odd choice since next year’s Dallas Open runs from Feb. 7-15.
Bookmaker 1xBet has signed a partnership agreement with the Dallas Open that runs through February 9, 2026. As part of this global partnership (except for the USA), 1 xBet receives the exclusive rights to be represented in the broadcasts of Dallas Open tournaments, as well as the opportunity to use unique photo and video content in its promotional materials.
On that last clause: The 1xBet website’s section on the tournament includes an image of two players easily identifiable from the 2025 Dallas Open field: Australia’s Aleksandar Vukic (albeit mirrored to turn him into a lefty) and the tournament’s champion, Denis Shapovalov.
Though tournaments can profit from deals with betting companies, the International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA) has barred tennis players from entering into deals with betting companies, so what looks like an endorsement would have been made without the knowledge, consent, or remuneration of Vukic or Shapovalov.
Shapovalov’s rep said he was on vacation and could not reply prior to publication, but Vukic confirmed to Bounces that he had no knowledge of his likeness being in this way.
“I have no affiliation or association with 1XBet and was not aware that my image was being used in their promotion of the Dallas Open,” Vukic, the ATP No. 82, replied to Bounces when reached for comment.
Billie Jean King Cup
The second tennis property to announce a 1xBet sponsorship this year was the Billie Jean King Cup, née Fed Cup, the women’s national team event which is run by the International Tennis Federation.
When reached by Bounces for comment on its relationship with 1xBet and the company’s controversial reputation, an ITF spokesperson responded with the following:
“All partnerships are rigorously vetted and involve only regulated parties wherever this is relevant. Any betting partnership is subject to strict regulations, developed in line with International Tennis Integrity Agency recommendations.”
The partnership, declaring 1xBet “our Official Global Betting Partner,” was announced by the ITF in April, shortly before the qualifying round of this year’s Billie Jean King Cup.
The April 10 press release on the BJK Cup website says, in part:
As the Road to Shenzhen has officially kicked off with the 2025 Qualifiers, 1xBet has become the newest addition to the Billie Jean King Cup by Gainbridge partner family until 2026.
This “until 2026” statement conflicts with the language on the 1xBet website, which says “the worldwide partnership will last until the end of 2027.”
When I recently reviewed Billie Jean King Cup highlights, I didn’t see 1xBet logos on any of the six courts used in those April qualifying rounds. But the 1xBet logo was displayed in Shenzhen for September’s BJK Cup finals. This prominent 1xBet logo placement came despite 1xBet not being licensed to operate in China, as well as also being unlawful in all but one (Kazakhstan) of the eight competing nations.
Like the Dallas Open, the BJK Cup logo is also on global versions of 1xBet’s website.
1xBet’s logo also reciprocally appears on the BJK Cup website alongside three more reputable brands: e.l.f. Cosmetics, Microsoft Copilot, and MasterCard.
Looking back at the BJK Cup’s press release about 1xBet, the most interesting section might be this one:
Kerstin Lutz, CEO of Billie Jean King Cup Limited, commented: “We are happy to announce and welcome a new sponsor partner for the Billie Jean King Cup, our Official Global Betting Partner, 1xBet. With their expertise and experience working with various sports rights holders, we are excited to see how we can bring the partnership to life.”
With its 18 years of experience in the betting and gambling industry, 1xBet is a well-established and award-winning platform where millions of people place bets on thousands of sporting events and play online casino games every month.
Mark Wilson, a 1xBet representative, said: “Signing a sponsorship contract with the Billie Jean King Cup is another milestone in the history of 1xBet. The agreement with the most prestigious women’s national team tennis tournament is a strategically important step that opens up new opportunities for promoting the brand among fans of the most popular tennis events.
“By investing in female sports tournaments, we contribute to the support of women in professional sports.”
Besides its rose-colored description of 1xBet, this section includes something fairly unusual for 1xBet literature: the name of a 1xBet representative, Mark Wilson.1
Wilson’s name also appears in a couple other press releases about 1xBet, including one from FIBA in which he is called “1xBet Global Sponsorship Manager.” But beyond these mentions, I could find no evidence that “Mark Wilson” of 1xBet is a real person. He has no presence on the 1xBet website, no LinkedIn page or other social media, no headshots—none of the things you would expect from a front-facing sports professional.
Also, on the 1xBet website’s section on Billie Jean King Cup, Mark Wilson’s quote is attributed to a nameless, faceless spokesperson.
Normally this line of thinking might seem overly paranoid, but my suspicions about “Mark Wilson” aren’t out of nowhere. 1xBet has proffered a fictional Anglo-named spokesman before (or at least has used other people’s faces on their spokesman’s profiles, as mentioned in Bellingcat’s article):
We also asked the bookmaker why the profile picture for its spokesman, “Alex Sommers”, was that of a CNN journalist, but did not receive a reply (CNN provided the original headshot to Bellingcat and said neither the company nor its reporter had been aware that the photograph was being used in this way).
The ITF spokesperson who told me that the 1xBet partnership had been “rigorously vetted” did not respond to follow-up messages asking if they had ever met or spoken with “Mark Wilson” or could otherwise confirm that it was a real person who was quoted in the Billie Jean King Cup press release.
ATP Challenger Tour
The most recent of 1xBet’s tennis partnerships was struck with the ATP. It’s an umbrella agreement that tournaments on the ATP Challenger Tour can opt into if they wish, receiving a fee for having a 1xBet logo superimposed onto their streaming broadcasts.
This logo has been visible this week, such as in this clip from the Montevideo Challenger in which, bafflingly, Facundo Mena was not defaulted for hitting the chair umpire with his thrown racquet. It’s not great technology; you can see the 1xBet logo trembling slightly in this clip.
Unusually, the ATP did not announce this deal on its website or in other official channels, but several low-quality websites—igamingexpress, Gambling Insider, EuropeanGaming.eu—did post press releases about the 1xBet-ATP deal in October.
Some articles named a specific number of tournaments which had already signed onto the deal—36 out of the total 217 ATP Challenger events. Some also included versions of this quote:
“We are proud to partner with 1xBet, whose reputation and contribution to the sport perfectly align with our mission to organize tennis tournaments of the highest level,” said a representative of the ATP Challenger Tour.
Given what I had learned about 1xBet, I was fairly shocked to see the ATP saying that 1xBet’s “reputation” could “perfectly align” with its own.
When I tried searching for the quote to figure out its origin, even Google’s AI side-eyed the assertion.
Since these articles were of unclear provenance, I reached out to an ATP spokesperson to confirm the veracity of the quote. Surprisingly, he responded that he “can confirm that the quote was neither issued nor approved by ATP.”
The quote was subsequently removed from some versions of the press release articles, but the sponsorship—and the disconnect between what 1xBet is and what we would hope tennis could be—remains.
Thanks for reading Bounces! If you have any more tips about tennis business or anything else in the sport, please let me know, via email, Instagram, or a message here. -Ben
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Information about 1xBet executives and employees is so scant that this press release was enough for someone to update the information box on 1xBet’s Wikipedia page with Mark Wilson’s name for “key people,” linking to the BJK Cup press release.
God, I hate sports betting. Not to put too much on this article, but it seems to exemplify so much of what's currently wrong about the world. Have some standards, people!
Props to the Mark Wilson spokesperson name. Is it Marc Babolat in France? Maruko Yonex in Japan?