Italian gambling incumbents are set to undertake further market adjustments, as the new 5Star-DP coalition government publishes the draft decree of its planned ‘Budget Law’.
Following on from 2019’s gambling advertising ban established by the former Lega-5Star coalition government, in 2020 Italy will move to establish new payment processing laws and operator AML registry.
New fiscal provisions introduced to the Budget Law will see the government prohibit Italian banks from processing any type of transaction associated with a non-authorised gambling operators.
Stating the intent to eradicate all forms of gambling corruption, 5Star-DP will support its new laws with fines ranging from a minimum of €300,000 to €1.3 million on banks deemed to have facilitated non-licensed payments.
In addition, the new coalition government will require all incumbents to sign-up to a new single registry controlled by Italy’s Customs & Monopolies Agency (ADM).
The government underlines that its registry has been established to tackle tax evasion and to fight organised crime, following the damaging revelations exposed by Italian Police’s Glassia investigation.
Enforcing a mandatory registry, 5Star-DP state that the ADM as gambling regulator must “improve its control over the public and retail gaming sectors”.
Furthermore, Italian news sources report that 5Star-DP may move to add further restrictions and controls on private equity funds and investors in gambling companies.
According to another article of the draft, the new red/yellow government is setting up more restrictions and control also on the equity funds which own the gaming companies.
Further draft conditions related to gambling see 5Star-DP extend wagering and bingo licensed concessions by one year (until 2020) at a cost of €6,000 per venue and €3,500 per wagering point.
Source:SBCnews