Regulation round-up 23 June 2015
The biggest regulatory news from the egaming industry in the last seven days (17 June to 23 June 2015)
Pressure mounts on German licensing procedure
German minister becomes first senior politician to publicly admit Interstate Treaty is not working
Germany’s standstill on gambling regulation could be broken before the end of the year after a German minister publicly criticised the situation ahead of an expected ECJ opinion in September.
The ECJ launched an investigation into the process following a referral from a Bavarian judge into the legality of the Interstate Treaty on Gambling, a move which one expert said may force political change in the country.
“The court posed several questions to the ECJ in regards to the licensing procedure,” Martin Arendts, a leading German gaming lawyer, told eGaming Review.
“We expect an opinion from the advocate general which will be published on 17 September, and then the court will make a ruling probably this year.
ASA scolds William Hill for “child friendly” social media ads
William Hill was reprimanded by the Advertising Standards Agency (ASA) over the use of images including a young child playing golf and teddy bears on its Twitter feed, which the watchdog ruled were likely to appeal to children.
The UK operator’s banned adverts were hosted on its @WillHillBet Twitter feed and included three separate images which featured children and teddy bears with the ASA ruling the images were irresponsible and in breach of its advertising guidelines
The first of three images was tweeted during The Masters golf tournament and featured a child holding a golf club and ball, which breached the ASA’s ban on marketing communication for gambling products featuring children.
Seven days in regulation:
Betting taxes to be slashed in New South Wales
The Australian state of New South Wales will halve the amount it taxes the horserace wagering sector over the next five years in a move designed to boost the profile of the sport in the state.
In a huge boost to the state’s racing sector, tax on bets will be slashed by more than half between now and 2020, in a move designed to give the horse racing industry much-needed extra funds to spend on product, racing facilities and prizemoney.
Currently the NSW Government taxes AU$3.22 per $100 wagered compared to just $1.28 in Victoria, and NSW Racing said the tax parity would help make New South Wales Australia’s “premier racing state”.
PokerStars and bwin.party secure French licence renewals
PokerStars and bwin.party were among a batch of operators to receive five year licence extensions to operate in the French online gambling market, the regulator announced last week.
The Amaya Gaming-owned poker giant received its online poker-licence from the French online gambling regulator l’Autorité de regulation des jeux en ligne (ARJEL) on Thursday following the expiration of its original licence issued in May 2010, when the market was first opened to competition from foreign operators.
The regulator also approved extensions for France Pari to develop sports and horse racing betting software, while bwin.party received a licence to operate online poker games for its PartyPoker brand until 2020 after having earlier received approval for sports betting.
Hungarian sports betting monopoly under threat
Politicians in Hungary will this week discuss proposed amendments to its Gambling Act that could spell the end to the country’s sports betting monopoly but limit remote casino licences to just two land-based operators.
Hungary is currently in the process of developing an online licensing system and under the current Act all seven land-based casinos are able to obtain a remote gambling licence should they meet licensing requirements.
But according to a proposed amendment, which is to be discussed in Parliament over the next two days, the market should be restricted to just two licensees which, if adopted would leave five businesses limited to their current retail operations.
Opinion: Dutch tax rates and fiscal neutrality
Dutch slot machines organisation, VAN, recently announced that it filed a complaint with the European Commission with respect to the proposed Remote Gaming Act. A reason for this complaint is that VAN is of the opinion that the proposed differentiation in tax rates under the Remote Gaming Act between licensed remote games of chance (20%) and land-based games of chance (29%) leads to a breach of the so-called fiscal neutrality principle.
The question is, however, whether the fiscal neutrality principle applies to a non-EU tax, such as the Dutch betting and gaming tax, and if so, whether licensed remote games of chance and land based games of chance are indeed similar services. Any breach of the fiscal neutrality principle may be justifiable in the instant case.