Swedish regulator reveals details of online gambling supplier licences

The regulator held an information session on the new permits.

Sweden.- The Swedish gambling regulator Spelinspektionen has held an information session to provide details on the process for its issuance of new online gambling supplier licences. The permits are due to become mandatory from July 1 2023, under new Swedish gambling legislation passed in November.

Spelinspektionen says it will open the application process for the permits on March 1 and urged suppliers to be ready to submit their applications for that date in order to receive a licence on time. The objective of the permit system is to improve channelisation to the regulated market.

The application fee has been set at SEK120,000 (around €10,000), and the regulator expects to initially issue about 70 licences. Only operators that work in the regulated market will be accepted for licences.

The licensed online gambling sector has largely welcomed the move, although some have called for the introduction of “umbrella permits” to reduce the administrative burden by allowing large suppliers to apply for one permit for all their subsidiaries into of having to submit many applications.

Gustaf Hoffstedt, secretary general of the trade association Branscheforenigen för Onlinespel (BOS), has said that the was a “positive attitude” towards B2B permits but that there was possibly “a deviating picture of expectations” on the impact they will have on channelisation.

Sweden’s new gambling legislation included other measures intended to exclude unlicensed gambling from the Swedish market, expanding the existing prohibition on promoting and advertising unlicensed gaming.

Some proposed changes were not introduced, including plans to moderate the marketing of licensed gaming and to change the rules on slot games on ferries between Sweden and Finland. Meanwhile, a permit will no longer be needed to exhibit entertainment games such as pinball, car games and LAN gaming.