Nazara Tech said on August 22 its associate firm, Moonshine Technologies, which operates PokerBaazi and other card-based platforms, has ceased offering online games played with money.
Shares of the company extended losses after the announcement and were last trading 4% lower at Rs 1,158 apiece.
"We wish to inform that, as a matter of abundant caution and in due respect of the Government’s mandate, Moonshine Technologies Private Limited (“Moonshine/Pokerbaazi”), an associate company in which Nazara Technologies Limited holds a 46.07% stake, has ceased offering real money online gaming operations," said the company in a stock exchange filing.
The firm sees no impact on its revenue or Ebitda since Moonshine’s revenue is not consolidated in the company’s financial statements.
Nazara Technologies Ltd.’s $122 million investment in PokerBaazi stands to be written down or provisioned for now, Chief Executive Officer Nitish Mittersain said in a phone conversation Thursday to Bloomberg.
Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha passed legislation to ban online games played with money as it looks to check rising instances of addiction, money laundering and financial fraud through such applications.
The Promotion and Regulation of Online Gaming Bill, 2025 also seeks to prohibit advertisements related to online money games as well as bars banks and financial institutions from facilitating or transferring funds for any of such games.
An online money game is one played by a user by depositing money in expectation of winning monetary and other enrichment.
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