 France is merging its isolated pool with other European countries soon, but that's not an end to good news from Europe this time: Czech Republic is on a verge of licensing international online gambling operators after its new legislation passed its penultimate procedural hurdle in senate and is awaiting just presidents approval.
The Czech senate approved the country’s new gambling law by a large margin last Thursday with 42 votes in favor, 23 abstentions and zero votes against. From that date, President of Czech Republic Miloš Zeman, has 30 days to sign the bill and if he does - it will go in effect as early as January 1st, 2017.
The bill will drop the longstanding prohibition on non-Czech operators obtaining online gambling and poker licenses. However, while operators based in the European Union and European Economic Area will now have the opportunity to apply for local licenses, they may find the bill’s new tax plan pretty high.
Under the new regime, sports betting and lotteries will be taxed at 23% of gross revenue, while casino games will face a 35% rate. These taxes are on top of the standard 19% business tax rate.
To protect its new licensees from unwanted competition, the new law will empower the Ministry of Finance with the now standard but largely ineffective tools of blocking unauthorized gambling domains. He will also have the slightly more effective right to ban payments to and from unauthorized operators and rules against illegal marketing.
The new law includes measures to minimize potential social harms too, including the adoption of a national exclusion database that will allow gamblers themselves to block themselves from accessing the poker websites, while also preventing access by bankrupt individuals or those receiving financial benefits from the state.
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France is merging its isolated pool with other European countries soon, but that's not an end to good news from Europe this time: Czech Republic is on a verge of licensing international online gambling operators after its new legislation passed its penultimate procedural hurdle in senate and is awaiting just presidents approval.
