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Curaçao’s Ministry of Finance confirmed on Tuesday (December 19) that the highly anticipated National Ordinance for Games of Chance (LOK) has been officially submitted to Parliament.
Minister of Finance Javier Silvania said: "We are very happy to reach this final stage. The submission of the LOK to Parliament is not just a procedural step, but a leap towards transformative progress.”
A day prior, a separate announcement was made by the Ministry of Finance outlining the licence fees and types issued by the Curaçao Gaming Control Board (GCB) under both the current legislation (NOOGH) and LOK.
A copy of the Ministry of Finance fees dated December 12 was uploaded by one of its consultants to social media on December 18. It is envisaged that under the new legislation, GCB will become a new independent licensing and supervisory authority.
The fees are based on the current LOK draft which is still awaiting parliamentary approval, meaning these figures are not final.
Under the current proposal, B2C licence application fees will be ANG9,000 (€4,570) plus a “one-off due diligence fee” of between ANG250 and ANG500 per person, depending on their role in the company.
There will also be an annual fee of ANG48,000 which will be payable upon the issuance of a licence, a ANG4,000 monthly fee, and ANG500 per year for each internet domain used.
These fees bring the total annual licence cost to be ANG96,000, excluding domain costs.
B2B licence application fees will also be ANG9,000 and include a “one-off due diligence fee” of between ANG250 and ANG500 per person.
The BCB licences will also pay an ANG48,000 annual fee, however, these licences will not be required to pay any monthly fee.
The Ministry of Finance document states that “companies that are grandfathered in from direct licence under the NOOGH to the LOK do not have to pay the ANG48,000 on enactment, rather that becomes due for the first time on the anniversary of their licence, however, the monthly fee will drop from ANG7,000 to ANG4,000 and the per-domain fee will also come into force at that point for every domain.”
Gambling licences that are currently being issued by the GCB under the existing NOOGH legislation are operating licences only, meaning there are currently no separate B2B or B2C licences.
The National Ordinance for Games of Chance (LOK) will introduce B2C and B2B categories.
A B2C licence is required by any entity as outlined in Section 4 of the online gaming application form. This includes companies that “interact directly with the players – controls player funds and/or player data management (B2C),” according to the document as well as companies such as platform providers that “meaningfully facilitate the B2C operations vis-à-vis player funds and player data (B2B2C)”.
Once LOK is enacted, “B2B licences are only mandatory for B2B entities that establish themselves in Curaçao. The B2B licence is optional for all other relevant international entities.”
The GCB began accepting online gambling licence applications on November 15, with the promise that applications will “seamlessly” transition from the current regime to a new gambling law planned for next year.
