New laws and regulations of online casinos in Sweden

Sweden is a big market when it comes to online gambling. Gambling in general is quite popular in Sweden and is part of their culture. You may not know this but Christmas is an especially exciting day for all Swedes who like to gamble. On December 23rd millions of Swedes gather around the TV in order to watch the live show of Bingolotto. So, with such a rich heritage it’s only natural to see a big number of Swedish players across online casinos.

But not everything was so bright for the Swedes so far. In 1934 the government imposed a state monopoly which was brought in place to prevent illegal gambling activities on the territory of Sweden. But this monopoly was a double-edged blade. Illegal gambling activities were indeed stopped across the territory of Sweden, but it didn’t work for online casinos. As you know some of the biggest online casinos in the world are run by Swedes. But all of these casinos are currently located on Malta or other countries which offer favorable terms. In return this means that the Swedish government is in fact losing money from tax revenue and jobs are opened abroad rather than in the country itself. At the same time Swedish players are not really protected when playing at online casinos, even though they are a desirable target group for many online casinos.

Online casinos in Sweden – new trends

So the time have come for things to change. The Swedish government decided to follow the example of the UK Gambling Commission. They passed a gambling act on the 14th of June, which is meant to come into action on January 1st 2019. This gambling act basically prohibits online casinos to accept players coming from the territory of Sweden without having a valid operating license issued by the Swedish government. Operators can already acquire several types of licenses based on their needs, which can cost anywhere from 40,000 to 70,000 euros. In addition to the operating license casinos are also obligated to pay 18% on the revenue which is brought in by Swedish players. Needless to say, that this move will not be welcomed by many online casino operators, but considering the high revenue which comes from the Swedish market most of them will comply with the new regulations.

So what does this mean for Swedish players? Well don’t worry the 18% tax is not applicable to the winnings from online casinos so you can still play freely. But the biggest advantage to players is that the market will now become regulated and a lot of the not so good operators will stop accepting Swedish players. In return you will have a much more safer environment to play at and a better choice of online casinos. So, in the near future we can expect to see some changes on the gambling market for Swedish players. It will be interesting to see which operators will decide to take on the Swedish license and which ones will simply decide to ban Swedish players altogether.