As the gaming industry evolves to incorporate constant changes in technology and entertainment media, gaming regulation is entering a parallel era of perpetual reform. Regulators in the more than three hundred U.S. gaming jurisdictions—forty states plus tribal entities—have to adapt their requirements to new games, new game delivery systems, new financial relationships, new customer identification processes, and new data management systems.

The fourth white paper on regulatory reform by the American Gaming Association spotlights the transformation of regulatory reform from a periodic exercise to a continuous process and celebrates recent reform efforts in five gaming jurisdictions that benefit customers, bolster the industry and create greater efficiencies for regulators without jeopardizing oversight and integrity.

Here, we examine three examples of regulators meeting challenges in very different aspects of gaming regulation:

• Ohio and Michigan have dropped decades-old regulations on the shipment of gaming machines, recognizing that the rules increased costs without serving their regulatory priorities.
• Nevada is allowing customers to open integrated “wagering accounts” for financial transactions relating to multiple forms of gaming at a casino, a critical first step toward meeting consumer expectations for seamless, simple financial tools.
• Pennsylvania and Mississippi have increased the ownership share that triggers the need for an “institutional investor” to acquire a gaming license, improving access to capital for licensed gaming companies.

In each instance, the regulatory reform improves the industry’s ability to accommodate changes in the marketplace. The ultimate challenge for regulators, however, is much larger than these three reforms. As technology continues to disrupt the gaming world, regulatory reinvention will have to keep pace with those disruptions while still ensuring the integrity of the industry.