Poland has issued two more approvals for online sports betting operators, bringing the market’s total number of licensees to 14.
Late last week, Poland’s Ministry of Finance issued an online sports betting license to Typiko Sp. z. oo. The company is based in Bielsko-Biała and the company name was registered in Poland in June 2016, listing Aleksandra Kuliniak as its president. Despite the similarity in name, the company doesn’t appear to be formally connected with German betting operator Tipico.
Two days later, the Ministry issued a similar diploma to the Warsaw-based Traf-Zakłady Wzajemne Sp. z oo. The company is a land-based race betting operator affiliated with the state-run lottery and slots monopoly Totalizator Sportowy.
The Ministry has now issued seven new online sports betting licenses this year, matching the total the government issued in 2017 following the late-2016 amendments to the country’s gambling laws.
However, besides Betclic Everest Group, Cherry AB and Fortuna Entertainment Group, most of the online betting industry’s big names continue to give Poland a wide berth. This aversion is primarily due to the market’s 12% tax on sports betting turnover, and the decision to grant an online casino monopoly to Totalizator Sportowy.
Not all international operators who lack Polish approval are giving the market a pass, as evidenced by the Ministry’s ever-growing blacklist of unauthorized gambling domains that accept Polish punters. Since the last update on November 29, the blacklist grew by an additional 157 names on November 30.
Most of the new additions belong to Russian operator BetCity and the usual assortment of Curacao-licensed online casinos, although a single Unibet domain did make the grade. The Kindred Group’s Unibet brand was singled out for scorn in October after a Polish media outlet published a report on the company cold-calling sports bettors while spoofing their phone number to appear to be calling from inside Poland.
