eGaming Review June 2012 | Page 18

[F I N A N C E NEWS ] VIEWPOINT GIULIO CORAGGIO senior associate, DLA Piper Italy The Italian betting exchange draft decree has finally passed the scrutiny of the European Commission. The bill had been filed with the European Commission in January 2012, but the usual three-month standstill period had been extended to 18 May because of a detailed opinion filed by Spain. However, it seems that the green light from the EC has now arrived three years after the so-called Abruzzo Decree had empowered the Italian regulator AAMS to issue betting exchange regulations. The future that this game will have in Italy is still unclear; at the moment only two operators (Betfair, and Microgame through Betdaq) seem to be interested in the offering, which is boosted by a taxation of 20% of gross revenues while fixed odd sportsbetting games are subject to a taxation of 2-5% of turnover – increasing by a further 0.5% in case of offering of bets on events outside of AAMS' official schedule (the Palinsesto). The success of the betting exchange might depend on whether AAMS will allow operators to rely on their international liquidity, which would be a unique case for Italy where all the other games – and especially poker and bingo games – do not allow their Italian players to play against foreign players. The international liquidity might be the first step towards a major change in the Italian market, allowing liquidity sharing, at least among regulated markets, for other games as well. Discussions are occurring among authorities for this purpose especially with Spain, but it is hard to foresee the timing of such change. OPERATORS RUSH TO MEET SPAIN TAX DEMANDS Spanish regulator con?rms tax cases are “separate” to licensing process Bwin.party and Sportingbet are among a group of operators in talks to pay substantial back-taxes to the Spanish Tax Authority, a move the country’s regulator claims in not connected to the forthcoming awarding of egaming licences. Bwin.party will pay up to €33m in order to facilitate its entry into the Spanish market, while Sportingbet will pay €14m “plus surcharges and interest up to €3.2m”. The ?gure cited by bwin.party, drawn up following the completion of a selfassessment for January 2009 to May 2011, when operat ors began paying 25% gross pro?t tax on activities in the Spanish market, includes surcharges and interest of €8m on top of a payment of €25.6m for the two-year period. A number of other European operators including 888, Betfair and Ladbrokes are also in discussions to pay their own bill with Ladbrokes settling for an undisclosed amount and Betfair paying “no more than €1m”. General director of Spain’s General Directorate for the Regulation of Gambling Enrique Alejo told eGaming Review the case is a “separate process” to awarding egaming licences, but that the regulator could be forced to deny companies licences based on the tax authority’s instructions. Alejo revealed the decision to claim tax on egaming operations was “an independent case brought by the Spanish tax authority”. However, he conceded that it would have to take direction from the tax authority over which companies had settled their bills. STARS PREPS AUDACIOUS FULL TILT ACQUISITION Agreement with the US Department of Justice could see Stars settle PokerStars is understood to have agreed a deal to acquire former US rival Full Tilt Poker in an audacious move that would see it extend its dominance of the sector and, according to sources, also potentially settle with the Department of Justice (DoJ) for less than half the original estimated amount suggested last April. Hours after rumours began to spread on the Two Plus Two poker forum and on Twitter, with former Team Full Tilt member Andy Bloch tweeting, “this might just be Super Tuesday”, the only previous bidder, Groupe Bernard Tapie (GBT), released a statement saying the consortium had pulled out of seven- month-long negotiations to buy the suspended site due to “unresolvable” legal complications and a failure to agree on a player repayment plan. Meanwhile, as GBT was preparing to officially announce its withdrawal, Stars staff on the Isle of Man received an internal memo from general counsel Paul Telford alerting them to the fact that they could “expect to read numerous rumours” suggesting the company was looking to acquire Full Tilt. However, it went on to state that the company was not in a position to go into any further detail as part of an agreement with the DoJ. 18 www.egrmagazine.com