‘Angle Stinks:’ Ainsworth CEO Resigns After Slapdown from Nevada Regulators

• Nevada regulators accuse Ainsworth boss of vanity, deception
• CEO’s conduct, secrecy, and evasive solutions spark outrage
• Resignation follows harsh rebuke from gaming board members

Harald Neumann resigned Monday because the CEO of Australian gaming machine large Ainsworth Sport Know-how after a bruising inquisition by the hands of the Nevada Gaming Management Board (NGCB). The board in the end discovered him unfit to carry a gaming license within the state.

Harald Neumann, above, confronted scathing rebuke from Nevada regulators earlier than resigning as Ainsworth CEO on Monday morning. (Picture: YouTube/NGCB)

Throughout a 90-minute grilling, the manager was accused of being “hostile,” belligerent,” “evasive,” and “conceited” with NGCB investigators, and of refusing their request at hand over his cellphone for 4 months. When he lastly did, some knowledge had been wiped, based on the board.

Corruption Probe

Neumann additionally didn’t disclose on his software that he was below investigation in his native Austria for corruption stemming from his stint as chairman of Austrian gaming large Novomatic AG, which is Ainsworth’s greatest shareholder.

Nor did he point out in his software a number of financial institution accounts, a home in Greece, a rental property in LA for his daughter, and month-to-month funds and a bank card to a “girlfriend” in Berlin.

The NGCB additionally accused Neumann of mendacity on a US visa software by describing himself as a “journalist.”

Your entire perspective stinks,” stated board member George Assad, a retired choose. “I don’t see regret. I don’t see acceptance of duty. I don’t see acknowledgement of guilt … I see vanity. That’s what I see.”

Neumann’s license software has been pending since he turned CEO of Ainsworth in 2021. The NGCB considers candidates’ character, honesty, and integrity through the course of. On the finish of Friday’s listening to, board members urged Neumann to withdraw his software.

Nevada’s licensing course of is the “gold customary” for gaming integrity worldwide, and being denied or withdrawing an software there can severely prohibit a gaming govt’s profession globally.

Board member Chandeni Sendall in the end accused Neumann of a “lack of emotional intelligence.”

“And so that you can be within the place that you just’re in as CEO, it’s form of mind-boggling – truthfully – to me you can perform at such a excessive degree and never have these primary management abilities and communications abilities, and that you just’re not … self-aware that you just’re coming off as argumentative, conceited, evasive to questions requested, troublesome.”

In a submitting to the ASX on Monday, Ainsworth stated Neuman would go away his function with speedy impact and “acknowledged his contribution” throughout his tenure. He shall be changed by present COO Ryan Comstock.

Novomatic Scandal

In Might 2019, Heinz-Christian Strache, Austria’s far-right vice chancellor, was pressured to resign after he was caught on videotape providing state contracts for money to a girl posing as a Russian Oligarch’s niece.

Within the video, Strache additionally discusses how firms could make unlawful political donations by utilizing nonprofit organizations to hide funds from auditors. Strache mentions Novomatic and a number of other different firms that funded his anti-immigration Freedom Social gathering on this method. Novomatic denies it did so.

In March 2019, Freedom Social gathering member and Strache crony Peter Sidlo was appointed CFO of Casinos Austria, then owned by Novomatic, regardless of having no govt or gaming business expertise.

Whistleblowers alleged that the corporate backed Sidlo’s election to the board as a part of a secret quid-pro-quo deal that might grease the skids on its ambition to construct a on line casino in Vienna.

Novomatic has denied being concerned in corruption.