Online sportsbetting operator reacts to regulatory changes in Poland

High tax costs and a monopolistic state-owned competition have apparently persuaded tier one online sports betting operator Pinnacle to announce that it is to exit the Polish market with effect from April 1 this year…the date on which Poland’s contentious new Gambling Act is implemented.

The Act calls for a prohibitive tax rate of 12 percent based on turnover, and gives game range advantages to the state-owned Totalizator Sportowy, unless the European Commission steps in with a last-minute objection.

The legislation also carries punitive enforcement provisions that include heavy fines, black-listing and ISP-and-financial transaction blocking.

Market scuttlebutt is that Pinnacle is hoping to acquire a UK Gambling Commission licence, which would enable it to return to the Northern Ireland and British market that it abandoned two years ago (see previous  reports).

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