European regulators set up informal association
Spanish, French, Italian and Portuguese authorities make pledge to work towards shared liquidity and ensure player protection.
Four European regulatory bodies have announced that they will work together on an informal basis in a move to share market data, discuss regulatory and technical standards, and ways to tackle corruption in sport.
Representatives of the Italian Customs and Monopolies Agency met with French regulator ARJEL, Spain’s General Directorate for the Regulation of Gambling (DGOJ) and Portuguese regulators held a two-day meeting in Paris in order to formalise the cooperation agreement, and have published a list of the key issues discussed.
The regulators have agreed that the need to ensure transparency, ethical management and prevent criminal activity is pressing, and regardless of differences in the regulatory models, the bodies will work together to protect consumers from addiction, saying that gambling must not become seen as part of everyday life.
The countries will also move towards sharing technical standards, adopt unified standards account protection, and look at pooling liquidity. A statement released by the Customs and Monopolies Agency revealed that representatives of the German authorities had participated in these discussions for the first time, and hinted at eventually working with the UK Gambling Commission once regulation is introduced.
Finally, the regulatory will publish biannual reports on their respective markets, before holding meetings to discuss the data. The first meeting will be held in Lisbon in the first half of next year, with the second to be held in Rome in H2 2013.
The deputy director of the Customs and Monopolies Authority Luigi Magistro said of the meeting: “We have laid the foundations for strong international cooperation to combat the illegal supply of online games. We have also launched a study to identify the best measures to be taken to prevent the phenomena of compulsive gambling, an issue on which, like Italy, the other countries are strongly committed. “
This meeting is the latest in a series of cooperation agreements to be established between European regulatory bodies over the course of the year, following a memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed between ARJEL and Italy’s former regulatory body AAMS in June 2011. The DGOJ agreed to join the MoU in January this year, before ARJEL signed a separate agreement with the UK Gambling Commission in July, and formalised a second bilateral cooperation agreement with the Spanish regulator in October.