Online poker EU. In history Croatia became the 28th member state of the European Union in July 2013 and shortly after, the country amended its existing gambling laws to make them compliant with EU requirements and approved by the European Commission in November 2014. However, not much has happened in the country since then.
Sports betting, casino, poker, bingo, and lottery are the products that are currently regulated by the local market. Apart from lottery services, which are provided by the state monopoly, literally any operator can apply for a license for the operation of any of the other gambling services.
However, there is one important requirement that needs to be met, operators need to have physical presence in the country regarding to be allowed to provide online services. To be more precise, they must own a land-based casino. (READ SO 100 STATES SUPPORT FORBIDDANCE OF ONLY POKER IN EE. UU)
Continuing with this line of licenses, Croatia´s first licensed online poker room was launched las week, but the website was expected to go live in mid-2016 but owners decided to delay launch for regulatory reasons. Under Croatia’s gambling laws, a license for the operation of online poker is valid from January 1 to December 31. An operator must also pay a licensing fee of around €600,000 in order to be given the nod to operate in the country. In other words, SuperSport would have had to pay the same amount for a license that would have been valid for several months only, as if it had insisted on launching sometime in mid-2016
The brand has already a certain level of recognition, they had been operating the market for over 13 years, along this SuperSport owns several betting shops across Croatia as well as a small brick-and-mortar casino. It has also been providing online sports betting options for the past seven years.
The new online poker room currently features No-Limit Hold’em games only as software is in beta mode. More poker variants are to be added in near future. Owners said that they are happy with the feedback they have received so far.
Foreign players, excluding ones from the US and several other jurisdictions, will be able to access the SuperSport poker site. However, given the fact that the website uses local currency, it is expected that Croatian players will account for the bulk of overall traffic.
