The National Gambling Authority (ANJ) published a study at the beginning of December on the illegal offer of online gambling and games of chance in France, with the aim of implementing new tools to counter it more effectively. However, it cannot be ruled out that in reality the opening of online casinos is being considered - already authorized in most European countries.
Fifteen years after the gambling market opened up to competition in 2010, the time may have come for France to legalize online casinos like most of its European neighbors. With no way to legally bet online on roulette, craps, baccarat, blackjack or even slot machines in France, speculation is rife as to when their ban will be lifted. And this, with or without the abolition of the French monopoly of physical “casino operators” (Barrière, Partouche, Joa, Tranchant, Cogit, etc.). Their syndicates, Casinos de France and ACIF, are campaigning to gain exclusivity to operate online casinos which would be the digital counterpart of their physical outlets. Casinos de France has been carrying out this project since 2019 – and even more so after the covid pandemic during which casino operators had to close for a total of nine months – a project that this union calls “Jade”, for “Remote Gaming experimental". . “The solution of opening online casino games to competition would be toxic for land-based casinos.
To avoid this, we must connect online casinos to physical casinos,” explained Philippe Bon, general delegate of Casinos de France, to the French magazine Edition Multimedia@. Will your wishes be fulfilled on January 25 during the presentation of the 2024-2026 strategic plan of the National Gaming Authority (ANJ)? This idea of experimental regulation of online casinos “reserved” only for casino operators has gained ground since the Jade project was presented to the ANJ, the French regulator of online gambling and open gambling competition, chaired by Isabelle Falque -Pierrotin since June 2020. Four amendments were presented in the Senate as part of the bill on the "security and regulation of digital space" (SREN), but at the beginning of July they were declared "inadmissible". A bill “Authorizing casino operators to offer online casino games” was also presented to the National Assembly on May 23, 2023, but to no avail.
