EGBA welcomes progress on Germany’s gambling regulations
23.01.2020
The European Gaming and Betting Association (EGBA) welcomes progress on Germany’s new draft state treaty for gambling regulation, which was provisionally agreed this past week by Germany’s regional state authorities. The new treaty, if agreed at the Minister-Presidents meeting on 5 March, would replace the existing second state treaty and come into force on July 1, 2021.
The objective of the new regulation is to regulate Germany’s gambling activity in an effective way and ensure gambling activity takes place within the legal, regulated gambling environment, particularly in the online sector. This will be a challenge given the very low channelling rates in the German gambling market. In 2017, the Düsseldorf Institute for Competition Economics (DICE) calculated that Germany had a channelling rate of only 1.8% (e.g. 1.8% of all gambling activity in Germany took place within the regulated/licensed environment).
EGBA welcomes the progress made and encourages the German authorities to ensure the new regulation will achieve the multiple objectives of consumer protection, state tax revenues and regulatory oversight of gambling. In this respect, EGBA believes that some of the proposals in the current draft treaty (re: live betting restrictions, limits on advertising and curbs on player account activity) would be detrimental and counterproductive to the intentions of the regulation and we urge the authorities to reconsider their approach.
“This is a positive development towards bringing Germany’s gambling regulation into the 21st century. The challenge will be to deliver a new regulation which is fit for the digital age we live in, which provides a safer gambling environment for consumers and enables a well-regulated and well-channelled market. We look forward to providing formal comments to the proposals in due course and continuing a constructive dialogue with the German authorities.” – Maarten Haijer, Secretary General.
