Online gambling is slowly advancing across all of Argentina
Several bills delivered by Executive Power were approved by the Senate of the Province of Santa Fe, Argentina, led by Governor Maximiliano Pullaro, on December 14. Among them was a proposal to regulate online gambling and betting.
At the Extraordinary Session No. 1 of the 141st Period, overseen by Vice Governor Gisela Scaglia, online gambling was approved after the Senate endorsed the preliminary approval from the Chamber of Deputies without any changes.
According to the Senate, the approved proposal “establishes a regulation for the development and exploitation of the activity of games of chance, sports betting and sports forecasts, online or with virtual modality, which are carried out through digital, electronic, computerized, telematic, interactive, telecommunication means and platforms, and those to be developed in the future.”
Pullaro’s Minister of Government, Deputy Fabián Bastía, proposed Bill 52.665, which was introduced by his counterpart, Marcelo González, and approved by the Chamber of Deputies on November 30.
The bill was approved by a wide margin in the Lower House and received unanimous approval in the Upper House. The new law will replace Decree 1451 from November 2020, which approved online gambling under the presumption that it was just a “modality” of existing legalization.
While the point of Bastía and González’s proposal was to fix previous regulations, the new law has several additions, such as legalized sports betting, increased taxes from 10% to 15% of gross earnings, and a special containment to the agencies, where a portion of the benefits will be distributed.
Additionally, 50% of the funds raised will be targeted toward campaigns for compulsive gambling prevention and awareness.
