Over the last couple of weeks, Australian online poker players shared their concern over the situation in the country, considering the fact that the Government is expected to pass new rules over the upcoming weeks.
The legislation changes would force foreign gambling websites to comply with new regulatory requirements in order to operate in the Australian gambling market. Some changes in the current legislation are planned to be implemented during the next sitting of the Parliament, and local online poker players fear that the amendments would make the leading offshore websites leave the market.
The latest changes in the online gambling legislation of the country are to make sure that foreign companies would not be able to provide local customers with poker offerings in case they have a licence. Currently, no licensing procedure for online poker exists in Australia. However, the country’s Government is aimed at changing this, and plans to make the procedure as heavy as possible for such operators that want to obtain a licence for peer-to-peer online poker operations.
The changes have been announced as a necessary step of the country’s policy to better protect people who suffer from problem gambling behaviour and prevent foreign gambling operators going round the regulations of live in-game betting. The amendments are to be made to the Interactive Gambling Act of 2001 and have already had their impact on the online poker market of Australia, causing the leading operator 888poker to leave in January 2017.
So, the local lawmakers have been recently focused on properly regulating the Australian market, which is currently known as one of the largest gambling markets in a global scale. The value of the gambling market in Australia is estimated to $20 billion to date, and it could be rising even more, as the internet gambling industry is the economy segment which is the fastest growing to date. Currently, the gambling business segment represents 1.2% of the total Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the country.
888poker Exodus
In the middle of January, 888’s poker brand revealed that it is to leave the online poker market of Australia, so its services would no longer be offered on the territory of the country. 888Poker gave a short notice of its decision to exit the Australian online poker market to its customers, as it sent them e-mails on January 13th.
However, local online poker players shared their fears that 888poker would not be the only brand to exit the market. The concerns were provoked by the fact that the Chief Financial Officer of Amaya Daniel Sebag made a note to the company’s investors that the operator was also considering an eventual market withdrawal of its PokerStars brand.
As already mentioned above, currently there is no licensing system for online poker on the territory of Australia. The new rules could lead to a serious market reshuffle and it seems 888poker may not be the only online poker operator to exit the market, which would undoubtedly lead to revenue decline both in terms of the operators’ market performance and the financial results of the online poker market in Australia.
- Author
Daniel Williams
