Leaked gambling reform drafts have revealed that Austria’s Finance Ministry has developed plans to liberalize the gambling sector and allow multiple operators to offer online...
Austria moves forward with new gambling law adoption
The Austrian government is moving towards the adoption of a new gambling law to put an end to the country’s monopolized industry, with officials now debating whether operators should face a cooling-off period before submitting license applications.
With Austrian Lotteries’ license set to expire in 2027, lawmakers are now at the final stage of coming to an agreement on gambling reforms. The final debates revolve around deciding whether offshore operators that used to serve Austrian citizens have to go through 24 to 36-month cooling-off periods before being allowed to apply for a local license.
A spokesperson for Casinos Austria, the parent company of Austrian Casinos, Patrick Minar, shared that giving a license immediately after the market opens to a previously illegal operator would be “absurd”. On the other hand, the Austrian Betting and Gaming Association (OWVG) has stressed that postponing licensing would continue pushing players towards offshore platforms.
President of OWVG, Simon Priglinger-Simader, commented:
“A cooling-off period would be the reform killer. The federal government wants to bring players into the regulated market, strengthen player protection and secure tax revenues. With cooling off, the opposite happens: tax-paying operators must leave, the black market jumps in, existing revenues collapse, and already budgeted additional revenues fail to materialize.”
Despite the debates, officials are looking to finalize the legislative package before the July parliamentary break.
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