Report SPORTS BETTING - PART 3
Sports betting has a long history in Latvia and in the 1950s the Hippodrome in the capital Riga was the country’s main venue for betting on horse races. However this burnt down in 1965 and sports gambling became illegal until independence in 1991.
Although the first gambling regulations were introduced in 1994 sports betting as a service had almost ceased to exist due to low popularity and the new regulations just made it more complicated.
But as the late 1990s saw casino and slot halls arrive, sports betting began to become more popular and betting points were opened in the larger cities.
The rivalry between foreign online betting organisations and locals led to just one single enterprise licence to provide traditional and interactive sports betting services.
At the end of the 1990s Tele Toto was given the only legal licence to offer sports betting in Latvia and is set up via two brands – Optibet and Latbet – and together they manage just over 20 betting shops of which the majority are in Riga. Wagers are held on football, basketball, ice hockey and handball in the main.
Tele Toto Ltd was founded in 1999 and in 2007 Tele Toto was sold for Ls1m to Swedish company Redbet Holding AB (now known as Nordic Leisure) which is a platform and service provider.
l
or operation of games of chance via the telephone:
1. €14,230 for a special licence 2. €14,230 for continuation of the licence 3. €14,230 for yearly re-registration of the licence • Yearly taxes include: 1. €17,279 for roulette tables 2. €17,279 for cards and dice games per table 3. €3,141 for slot machines.
4. Tax on game of chance via the telephone is 15 per cent of GGR
5. Gaming tax for totalisator and betting is 15 per cent of GGR
6. Gaming tax of bingo games is 10 per cent of GGR 7. Online gaming tax is 10 per cent of GGR.
Sports betting has a long history in Latvia and in the 1950s the Hippodrome in Riga was the
country’s main venue for betting on horse races. However this
burnt down in 1965 and sports gambling became illegal until independence in 1991.
Nordic Leisure acquired a 98 per cent of the share capital in Tele Toto and licences its in-house developed exchange betting platform and offers online sports, betting, poker and casino games. Nordic’s operations now comprise of Optibet in Latvia plus Optiwin in Estonia, Redbet Gaming and Red Sports in Malta.
It’s not a hugely popular sector of the gambling market compared to slots and casinos. In 2012 the sports betting market was worth €3m.
For a company to set up a sports betting company licences are only issued to capital companies
LATVIA SPORTS BETTING NO. OF BETTING SHOPS: 38 NON REMOTE OPERATORS: 4 GGR: €0,808M HORSE TRACKS: 0 ONLINE MARKET: 2006 REMOTE BETTING GGR: €4.7BN TOTAL (OF WHICH €2.6BN BETTING) REMOTE LICENCES: 6 LICENSING: LOTTERIES AND GAMBLING SUPERVISORY INSPECTION (IAUI)
(limited liability company) or a joint stock company established in Latvia with not less than 51 per cent local shareholding (including EU investors). They require a total of €1.4m in paid up share capital minimum.
There is an annual registration fee of €42,690 and the tax rate for sports betting is now 15 per cent.
There are currently 22 gaming licences issued by the IAUI including one lottery company, 15 landbased gaming operators and six online operators.
There are 323 gaming halls and six casinos currently open in Latvia. There are a total of 8,495 slots across these venues and these slots saw gross gaming revenues of €142m in 2013.
There are 38 betting shops open via four main operators – Optibet, Viensviens, Olympic Casino Latvia and Joker. The GGR for betting points was €0,808m last year.
Of the 16 landbased gaming companies the biggest companies include ALFOR (Admiral Clubs) with a GGR of €51.7m in 2013; Olympic Casino with €34.1m GGR; Joker with €20.8m; Admiral with €18.2m; DLV with €8m and Furors with €7.1m
In the first quarter of 2014 the revenues from all sectors amounted to a total of €41m and this was divided between slot machines with the biggest amount (77 per cent), lotteries (12.6 per cent), gaming tables (seven per cent), online gaming (two per cent), betting (0.6 per cent) and bingo (0.2 per cent).
ONLINE The online gambling landscape in Latvia is possibly
due to change as and when the new bill comes into place. Online gambling has been permitted since 2006 and operators were charged a 10 per cent interactive betting tax which didn’t stop some 160 operational sites from springing up.
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