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Contention About EU Online Casino Monopolies

Land and online casino gambling monopolies in the European Union are one of the hot ticket debate items right now. The European Commission, and indeed the online casinos and gambling companies themselves, argue that EU policy calls for a completely open gambling market between all EU member-states. But that is much easier said than done – many of the countries operating state monopolies are reticent to alter their monopolistic legislation… a fact that is causing some very real problems between the gambling companies and the state governments. The latest issue involves the Greek land betting monopoly OPAP and Stanleybet, a prominent land bookie in the EU.

The Greek government has been in negotiations with the European Commission for some time now and yet there has been no resolve. The Greek government refuses to acknowledge that land and online casino gambling brands from other EU countries also have a right to access the Greek betting market. OPAP is a government run organization and is hugely lucrative for the Greek government – and no matter what the argument is, this is what it comes down to. Those countries refusing to open their markets to foreign online casinos and gambling companies are only looking to protect their own revenue.

As for the situation at hand, Stanleybet is a EU based company that is willing to push the limits in the Greek market, confident in the fact that if the case is taken to the European Court of Justice, that Stanleybet will win. The current contention comes from the fact that Stanleybet opened up a land betting shop last week in Greece – despite the Greek government’s restrictions on competition, and as such the Greek police arrested several of the employees and confiscated the betting equipment. This is just the beginning though for Stanleybet, which plans to fight the case for as long as it takes to secure an open Greek betting industry.