Curaçao’s regulator to oversee online gaming

The regulatory body in charge of land-based casinos will now oversee online gaming as well.

Curaçao.- The supervision of the online gaming sector is set to be transferred from Curaçao’s Ministry of Justice to the Minister of Finance, who is in charge of the local Gaming Control Board (GCB).

While Curaçao is a constituent country of the Netherlands, legislators from the latter have urged new regulations as they argue that Curaçao-licensed online casinos serving Dutch punters don’t have necessary approvals to do so.

Local news outlet Antilliaans Dagblad reported that one of the arguments to extend the supervision and designate GCB as the “uniform regulator of games of chance” in Curaçao is because “in the case of illegal games of chance, the fairness of the offered payment of the prizes is not guarantees, which disadvantaged the players and detracts from the international image of Curaçao,” explains Kenneth Gijsbertha, Minister of Finance.

Up until now, there was no specific supervision of online gaming in the territory, even if the activity has significantly increased in recent years and received attention from international players.

According to the minister of Finance, the supervision from the GCB covers all games of chance offered on or from Curaçao and is uniformly implemented across all sectors. The supervision also includes laws and regulations to prevent and fight money laundering, terrorist financing and proliferation, as well as illegal games of chance.

Gijsbertha said that illegal providers “do not contribute to the coffers” as they do not pay license fees or taxes on the illegally obtained income, and they constitute unfair competition for legally operating providers.