On February 27, Moscow’s Barvikha Concert Hall hosted the second Russian award in the field of sports and betting, organized by the Rating of Bookmakers company. BR Awards 2023 was held in a big way: the number of nominations increased to 23 compared with ten at the debut award. The special guest of the event was the legendary Italian football player Alessandro Del Piero. About what role the former Juventus striker played in the ceremony and who became the best bookmaker in Russia is in our material.
Photo: “Rating of Bookmakers”
In 2023, the opening ceremony of the ceremony was framed with references to ancient Greek myths: an opera singer in the image of a gorgon Medusa appeared on the stage, and acrobats in traditional toga supplemented the number.
The founder of “RB” Paruyr Shahbazyan began the evening with a story about the mission that his company is performing on the market. For this, Shahbazyan mentioned the scientific work of the American economist George Akerlof, “The market for lemons: the uncertainty of quality and the market mechanism.”
In it, the scientist deduced an interesting idea: if the buyer in the market does not possess information about the quality of the goods to the same extent as the seller, then he will be inclined to refuse the transaction. To buy such goods, unexplored from the point of view of the client, he will only agree with a discount, which at a distance can lead to the complete disappearance of the market. Indeed, in such a situation, sellers will simply have to degrade the product, continuing to pass it off for better quality, in order to be able to make a profit and at the same time satisfy the needs of the client.
“In the 1970s, this happened in America – with the used car market. But the situation has been corrected. Independent certifiers like Audi Certified, BMW Certified managed to do this – thanks to them, people understood what kind of cars they were buying. As a result, the crisis is gone. Why am I talking about this theory? We thought that we were simply making a rating for bookmakers. But it turned out that all this time we were saving the industry from extinction! ”
Photo: “Rating of Bookmakers”
Shahbazyan also outlined the main problem facing betting companies today. According to the founder of RB, society will learn to trust BC if the industry manages to resolve the issue with players who lose control and spend all their savings on bets. As a solution to it, Shahbazyan proposed introducing a self-exclusion procedure – with its help, players will be able to restrict their access to the BC for a certain period of time. The founder of RB noted that, having solved this problem, the bookmaking industry will be able to eradicate the prejudices about its activities that still exist in society.
The solemn part of the ceremony was opened by Alessandro Del Piero, who had to obtain a Russian visa in Yerevan, since the path to the Milan Embassy was blocked for him due to the outbreak of coronavirus. The football player had two important tasks at once at this ceremony: Alessandro awarded the winner in the nomination “Best bookmaker of the year”, and dinner with him was designated as a lot for a charity auction, all the funds from which the organizers will send to the Konstantin Khabensky fund.
Starting price for dinner with Del Piero was ₽500 thousand, and each step to increase was worth ₽100 thousand. Following the auction, the Khabensky Fund received ₽1.7 million from one of the guests of the ceremony, as well as additional ₽5 million from the “Rating of Bookmakers.” “Thanks to this evening, many of our foundation’s wards will be able to recover much faster, go out into the big life, go in for sports or become sports fans,” Konstantin Khabensky said from the stage at the end of the auction.
Photo: “Rating of Bookmakers”
Not without other world famous celebrities – Conor McGregor, who represents Parimatch, won the award for the best ambassador of BC. Unfortunately, the fighter was too busy choosing his next octagon opponent, so Dmitry Sergeyev, the company’s CEO, received the prize for him and showed a great sense of humor.
“It was a crazy time — Conor’s arrival in Moscow. To arrange the throwing of a bottle of Dagestanis at the bottom of the hotel was quite difficult. But everyone liked it, thank you all. Next time we plan to bring it here again so that the Dagestanis are already prepared. ”
The winners in the nomination “Best eSports bookmaker” were announced closer to the closing ceremony. The prize was won by GG.Bet, which bypassed last year’s winner, Parimatch, in the final vote. GG.Bet representative Konstantin Hrup noted that e-sports is the most progressive branch of sports today.
The next special prize “The Best e-Sports Media” was earned by Cybersport.ru, after which the organizers announced the winners in the final nominations. Grand Prix “Best Bookmaker of the Year” won the “Betting League” – it also won in 2019. At the end of the ceremony, a buffet was waiting for guests.
Photo: “Rating of Bookmakers”
BR Awards is an annual award in the field of sports and betting, which was held for the second time in 2023. The organizer was the Bookmakers Rating company, and the jury included Nikolai Petrosyan, director of the media department of ESforce Holding, Nikolay Oganezov, chairman of the RF CCI subcommittee on betting and betting, Russian tennis player Mikhail Yuzhny and other experts.
