Recent articles by Casino News Daily showed similar trends in the online poker markets of France and Spain. Online gambling figures released today by Italian gambling authorities appeared as yet another manifestation of the insecure state of Europe’s online poker, particularly of cash game poker.
Generally speaking, cash game poker has been decreasing for years now in all three countries. Here it is important to note that the regulatory conditions under which online poker is provided in France, Italy, and Spain are fairly similar. Upon regulating their markets, regulators decided to ring-fence them, thus making it impossible for players from one of the three countries to play against peers from any other country but their own.
The too strict regulations did not appeal to regular poker players, who were in constant search for diversity of stakes and pools. Such players either took the difficult decision to relocate to jurisdictions with more reasonable regulations or opted for black-market operators, hence the continued drop of cash game poker figures.
According to the latest information released by Italian regulators and cited by local media, regulated cash games had another difficult month in July. Overall cash game stakes totaled €5.1 million, down 2.9% from the same month a year earlier. During the seven months to July 31, 2017, licensed online poker operators saw stakes of €40.9 million, reflecting a decrease of 5.3% from the same period of 2016.
Tournament poker performed much better in July and during the reviewed seven months. Turnover amounted to €5.9 million in July, up 22.9% from July 2016. The first seven months of the year were marked by a 17.4% increase in turnover to €49.1 million.
Italy, together with France, Spain, and Portugal, participates in the so-called shared online poker liquidity project. Regulators from the four countries signed the agreement that would mark the project’s beginning at a special meeting that took place in Rome on July 6. The plan will see the creation of an online poker network that would combine players from all involved jurisdictions.
The network is hoped to help the four countries improve the state of their online poker markets and eventually see increased interest in cash game poker and growth in tax money generated from the game.
In July, the regulators of France and Spain released information about what they would require from operators willing to participate in the project. Among other things, they will have to make sure that their players are informed in due time and manner about the new poker environment in which they will be playing and that proper mechanisms are deployed in relation to the prevention of money laundering and other criminal activities.
The first online poker network is expected to be launched by the end of the year or early in 2018.
