The first debts for fines imposed on bloggers and media outlets by PlayCity have appeared in the registers
The first multi-million dollar fines for advertising gambling can now be found in the Unified Register of Debtors. A total of 13 bloggers and 1 Telegram channel received fines from the State Agency for the Control of Gambling and Lottery Business in Ukraine PlayCity for advertising online casinos. Currently, 8 fines are being appealed by the violators. So far, none of the fines have been paid, but some have already been transferred for enforcement, and some are being appealed in court.
The first proceedings for unpaid fines for illegal casino advertising appeared in the Unified Register of Debtors. Thus, two proceedings for unpaid fines from the State Agency PlayCity in the amount of UAH 4.8 million and UAH 24,000 against blogger Karina Kuchmenko (Simbochka) appeared in the Unified Register of Debtors in early January this year.
We remind you that you can check for open proceedings due to debts and obtain a statement of their absence on the Unified Register of Debtors page.
This is the first active proceeding in the register. Previously, the Unified Register of Debtors had records of fines imposed by PlayCity on two other bloggers: Diana Levonovna Movsesyan (Instagram account @xl.rusalochka.life) and Maxim Andriyovych Lavrinenko (Telegram channel “Truha”). However, in both cases, the opening of proceedings has been refused. In response to a request from OpenDataBot, PlayCity explained that there are procedural reasons for this, in particular, due to formal requirements for documents and the opening of court proceedings to appeal the relevant decisions.
A total of 13 bloggers and one media outlet, namely the Telegram channel “Truha,” received fines for advertising online casinos. Currently, none of the fines imposed have been paid voluntarily. PlayCity explains that the law provides for a period of up to three months for voluntary payment from the moment the sanction is imposed. For some of the decisions, this period has not yet expired.
At the same time, some of the defendants have decided to defend their position in court. Currently, seven bloggers and one media outlet are appealing PlayCity’s decision. Most of the lawsuits have resulted in administrative proceedings, and the cases are pending in court. At the same time, no court decisions on the merits of the disputes have been made yet.
“We are consistently developing the practice of bringing to justice those responsible for illegal gambling advertising and will continue to respond to all identified violations within the limits of our authority. We are convinced of the legitimacy of the sanctions applied and expect to defend our position in court,” commented Gennady Novikov, head of the PlayCity state agency.
It should be noted that last year, PlayCity intensified its fight against illegal gambling advertising in the Ukrainian information space. This concerns non-compliance with the provisions of the Law of Ukraine “On Advertising” and the provisions of the Law “On State Regulation of Activities Related to the Organization and Conduct of Gambling.” These acts define both the prohibitions on advertising gambling and the amounts of fines for violating them.
The National Bank of Ukraine fined FC Axioma LLC UAH 200,000 for violating currency legislation.
The violations concerned the timing of providing fragments of video archive data at the request of the NBU. A similar fine of UAH 200,000 was imposed on FC Centrofinance LLC for failure to comply with the requirements for equipping a separate unit with a video surveillance system for currency transactions.
Axioma, Centrofinance, FC, FINE, NBU
Twelve publishers have been fined a total of UAH 1.896 million for violating the terms of delivery of textbooks to general secondary education institutions in 2025, according to the Institute for the Modernisation of Education Content of the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine.
According to the Institute’s response to a request from the agency ‘Interfax-Ukraine’, twelve publishers violated the deadlines for delivering textbooks to general secondary education institutions in 2025.
In this regard, these publishers have been fined for violating the terms of the contract, in particular: Abetka LLC must pay a fine of 15,063 hryvnias; Alaton Publishing House LLC – 323,987 hryvnias; Aston LLC – UAH 142,505; Atlant Publishing House LLC – UAH 140; Bukrek MPP – UAH 2,189; Genesis LLC – UAH 684,832; TO ‘Gymnasium’ LLC – 141,936 UAH; ‘Methodika Publishing’ LLC – 528 UAH; ‘Educational Book – Bohdan’ Publishing House LLC – 7,202 UAH; ‘UOVC ’ORION” LLC – 561,157 UAH; Rannok Publishing House LLC – 4,916 UAH; Shkolyar Educational and Publishing Centre LLC – 12,455 UAH.
As reported, on 5 September 2025, the Minister of Education and Science of Ukraine, Oksen Lisovyi, stated that all planned textbooks would be accepted by schools by 15 September. However, as of 15 September, more than 10% of the planned textbooks had still not been delivered to schools.
On 18 September 2025, the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Education, Science and Innovation, as in the previous year, recognised the work of the Ministry of Education in providing schools with textbooks as unsatisfactory and acknowledged that the new mechanism for delivering textbooks needed urgent refinement.
On 25 September 2025, Deputy Minister of Education and Science Nadiya Kuzmychova announced that publishers who failed to deliver textbooks to schools on time would pay millions in penalties. She also expressed hope that the issue of textbook delivery would be resolved by the end of September.
On 14 November 2025, according to data from the dashboard of the Ministry of Education’s Institute of Educational Analytics, 100% of the planned textbooks had been delivered to schools.
At the end of December 2025, the Ministry of Education announced that in 2026 Ukraine would switch to a two-year cycle for the creation of textbooks and would continue to implement a model of delivering textbooks from publishers directly to schools.
The National Bank of Ukraine fined FC Goldana Plus LLC and FC Forward Finance LLC UAH 340,000 each.
According to the regulator, the companies failed to properly submit accurate information and documents in full to the NBU upon request.
The National Bank of Ukraine imposed sanctions on the financial institution EV.RO.Lombard EV.RO.Finance LTD and Company, imposing a fine of UAH 595,000.
The fine was imposed for violations of financial monitoring requirements, in particular with regard to internal documents and procedures, risk-based approach, reporting, and responses to regulator requests.
The National Bank of Ukraine has fined Clearing House Bank UAH 200,000 for violating financial monitoring legislation.
In particular, the bank failed to comply with the prohibition on notifying customers of decisions made by the specially authorized body for financial transactions, the NBU said.
