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The tender for the award of betting shop licenses in Italy is expected to be postponed due to the lack of agreement with municipalities.
I have already discussed in this blog post about the tendering process for the award of 15,000 betting shop and corner shop licenses which was expected to be launched by the end of June 2016.
The main dependency of this tender is the lack of agreement reached between the Government and the local municipalities as to the time of operation and the distances between betting shops/gaming halls and sensitive places (e.g. churches, schools, hospitals).
This agreement was meant to be reached by the end of April 2016, but the negotiations are still ongoing. For this reason the Italian gaming regulator has now sent to all the current license holders a form which would enable any current license holder to continue operating also after the 30th of June 2016 when their licenses will expire provided that they
- submit a form where they commit to participate to the tendering process when launched and
- extend the term of the bank guarantee currently in place to cover tax liabilities as well as liabilities towards players.
A similar delay might occur in relation to the tendering process for the award of new online licenses. But in such case it is more likely that the tender will be launched by July 2016 as provided by the law.
The evolution of the betting shop tender should be monitored closely as it might have a quick acceleration following the agreement between the Government and the municipalities.
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