Finnish online gambling adopts Swedish experience

The Finnish online gambling industry is considered to be quite limited, since the country has a monopoly of one operator - Veikkaus. However, local lawmakers are planning an audit of the industry.

Until recently, the Finnish online gambling sector was very similar to the Swedish one. In Finland, there is a monopoly of one operator on the provision of various gambling services: lotteries, sports betting, gaming machines and betting on horse racing. This greatly limits the market. Therefore, local authorities have decided to audit the online gambling industry. This was announced in December 2018. Soon, the Finnish gambling regulator will be overwhelmed with applications for licensing, which is especially important in view of the decline in Veikkaus revenues.

Several operators have already started advertising campaigns in Finland. Online casinos are ready to offer convenient withdrawals to the accounts of Finnish banks and the use of the state language in games.

The Swedish regulated market needs localized casino games like any other. This question is relevant for European countries, where English is not the main language. Despite the fact that the Swedish market was officially opened only a few days ago, several large developers of slot machines, such as Microgaming, already offer localized games.

The developers of online casinos in Finland should also be prepared for the fact that, as soon as the new legislation enters into force, they will need to provide the full range of services at the proper level. In addition to translating the text, it is quite possible that they will have to make changes to the games themselves in order to conform to the new rules of the market. Restrictions may also affect the frequency and size of financial transactions.

When developing new software, companies will need to take into account the thematic interests of local players.