A major reform of the Italian rules on online gambling, including regulations on the award of remote gaming licenses, has been approved by the Italian Board of Ministry. This move represents a paramount change compared to the past.

The legislative decree is very complex, but the most relevant provisions can be summarised as follows:

1. There will be a tender for the award of 50 new online gaming licenses that, according to the wording of the law, shall be awarded before 31 December 2024 since all the current licenses will expire by that date. It seems very challenging timing, but this is the plan of the legislator;
2. The price for each nine year license will be EUR7 million per license to which an annual license fee equal to 3% of the Gross Gaming Revenue (GGR) net of gambling taxes shall be paid. Also, operators shall invest an amount equal to 0.2 of their GGR net of gambling taxes in responsible gaming campaigns. Groups cannot hold more than five licenses which might be a problem in case of aggregation;
3. Very stringent requirements are provided to meet the suitability criteria and potential penalties are also increased to represent a deterrent for operators;
4. Strong limitations are introduced to skins / white label sites because operators can only have one website with an Italian top level domain name and its logo shown on the site. No provisions have been introduced to allow additional skins against the payment of a potential fee;
5. Shops selling top up cards to transfer funds to gaming accounts shall be recorded in a specific registry and pay an annual fee of EUR100 per shop. Also, gambling activity or withdrawal of funds from the shops is limited;
6. Stronger rules have been introduced against the offering of games in Italy through unlicensed gambling websites, also through the implementation of payment blocking measures.

This is a high level summary of the most relevant changes introduced. In the coming weeks, we will publish updates on specific issues. 

Please reach out to us if you have specific questions.