Online casinos are still outside of the law

The players can still play, but online casinos cannot be registered in Germany

Online gambling is one of the most widespread industries at the moment, but despite the fact that there are, literally, hundreds of millions of players from all over the world who want to take part in online gambling, in one form or another, there is still little interest from lawmakers throughout the globe to pass laws that would not only make the industry legal, but it would bring a lot of income from taxes to all of the countries involved.

As the gambling news have widely covered recently, Germany has passed a new online gambling law, with 15 of the 16 Lands coming to an agreement on the new Gambling Treaty. Unfortunately, the news aren’t great for online casino players and online poker players. The new law still bans online casino games and online poker games in the country, but some progress has been reached for online sports betting sites, with 20 licenses being available for this segment. However, there’s a catch here, as well, as there will be a €1,000 cap on each player’s bets within an online bookmaker.

This restrictive law has been drafted in such a way that it could be compatible with the European Union laws on the matter. As crazy as it might seem, the law, in its present state, is an improvement over the one drafted this summer, which only suggested 7 licenses for online sports betting websites, and a 17% turnover tax (as opposed to the 5% tax in the current text).

Many online gambling supporters were against Germany’s ruling. The RGA (Remote Gambling Association, a group that fights for online gambling sites), expressed their frustration with Germany’s decision. As the Group’s CEO declared, this new law will have little effect on the number of German online gamblers that are registered with operators outside of the country, so this policy will have a limited impact.

Just to be clear, this new law doesn’t make online poker and online casinos illegal to play within the country, it just makes it illegal for such companies to be registered in Germany. This has an effect on online gamblers, as taxes are higher and revenues are significantly lower, with them being forced to play on sites that are registered in other countries. But hopefully, in the future more and more countries will be more open towards online gambling companies.