it began clear late last year that the gambling regulators of France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, and the UK were in continued talks for the creation of a poker network that would merge their player pools for better profitability. Talks have progressed quickly over the past several months and it was announced that first shared online poker liquidity agreements will be signed by the end of June. As a result, the first poker network could be created by the year’s end or early in 2018.(READ HERE: THE FIRST ONLINE POKER NETWORK IN EUROPE)
According to latest reports, the UK may not be part of the effort or at least not for now, due to the start of Brexit negotiations.
On the other hand, the regulators of Austria and Germany have joined ongoing talks and may eventually participate in the shared liquidity project.
Although the representatives of the Spanish gambling regulator, Dirección General de Ordenación del Juego (DGOJ), and its Danish counterpart, Spillemyndigheden, participated earlier this week in a meeting that saw gambling officials from the two bodies discuss the future of the growing online gambling sector.
The meeting took place on June 19-20 in Madrid. Representatives of the regulators dwelt on different topics, all centered around the way the online gambling market should be designed in order to function in accordance with contemporary demand. Regulation of commercial communications was another important matter gambling authorities paid special attention to (READ HERE: WITH DELAY BUT FINALLY JOINT THE ONLINE POKER LIQUIDITY SHARING)
The Madrid meeting between Danish and Spanish gambling regulators could be a good signal that Denmark may express interest in taking part of the effort that is aimed to improve the state of European online poker. Here it is important to note that the Danish online poker market is not ring-fenced, unlike the ones of Spain, Portugal, Italy, and France. This means that Danish players can play at online poker websites that are licensed by other EU gambling authorities.
