Ontario’s Alcohol and Gaming Commission (AGCO) has issued a Notice of Proposed Order to suspend PointsBet Canada’s iGaming registration for five days, the first such suspension action in the history of the province’s regulated online market.
The regulator says the case stems from a systemic failure to monitor, detect, document, and report suspicious betting tied to the 2024 Jontay Porter bet-rigging conspiracy, warning that licensed operators are the first line of defense for sports integrity in Ontario.
AGCO: PointsBet initially denied the bets existed
After insider-betting allegations surfaced in early 2024, AGCO ordered all Ontario-regulated sportsbooks to confirm whether they had offered markets on former NBA player Jontay Porter and whether any suspicious activity had been detected and reported. AGCO says PointsBet responded after delay that it had not offered those bets.
But following the public release of a U.S. Department of Justice indictment in October 2025, AGCO required operators to reconfirm. The regulator says PointsBet then acknowledged 18 months after its initial response that it had offered the bets, and AGCO’s review of wagering data found indicators that should have been detected and reported when the betting occurred.
What happens next: appeal window and market impact
Because this is a proposed order, PointsBet has 15 days to appeal to Ontario’s Licence Appeal Tribunal, and industry reporting indicates the suspension would not take effect immediately during that window.
AGCO also noted this is not PointsBet’s first compliance issue in Ontario, pointing to prior monetary penalties for advertising/inducement violations (May 2022) and responsible gambling standard breaches (November 2023) signaling a tougher enforcement posture as regulators scrutinize integrity controls across sportsbooks.
Source: https://www.newswire.ca/news-releases/agco-moves-to-suspend-pointsbet-for-failing-to-report-suspicious-nba-bets-on-jontay-porter-831915139.html
