Poso (ADM): ‘Protecting Citizens Only Through Legal Gambling’

Italian Gaming Authority Focuses on Legality and Player Protection

Salerno – “Only with rules and legality can we protect players, winnings, prohibit minors from betting, and expose phenomena linked to illegality and possible fraud against the treasury and gaming companies. We are working on the reorganization of the sector, and the physical aspect will soon see the light, while we are committed to training and supporting those who offer gaming on Italian territory.”

This statement was made by Elisabetta Poso, director of the Entertainment Devices Office of the Customs and Monopolies Agency (Adm), during the workshop “In the Name of Legality – Without Rules There is No Safe Game” organized by Codere Italia in Salerno and moderated by Riccardo Pedrizzi, journalist, writer, and former president of the Finance and Treasury Committee of the Senate.

The Role of Adm in Ensuring Fair Play

Adm’s role has been to put the importance of the regulator back at the center: “Many actions for the protection of legality are possible thanks to the fact that all transactions of legal gaming are traced and identified to the physical subject who owns the gaming account,” Poso began. “Through this system, it is possible to expose situations of illegality. This is why I would like to enhance legal gaming, which allows us to combat illegal activities and activate tools for the prevention and treatment of pathologies related to addictions, particularly in physical gaming. Only in this way is it easier to find ways for the prevention and treatment of pathological gambling.”

Upcoming Changes to Physical Gaming Regulations

A system that is also essential in view of the reorganization: “There will be various instruments that we will try to enact within the implementing decree of the long-awaited law on physical gaming. An imminent measure,” Poso explained. “I cannot clearly go into the details because it is an official document and not yet available. The discussion with representatives of the regions, of the institutions responsible for health, lasted a long time; we are talking about a year. Already since February, we have given the Customs and Monopolies Agency all the technical support necessary to the ministry for the drafting of a text. This text, still in draft form, follows the indications of the delegation law of 2023. Among the measures in the field, there will be attention to the prevention of pathological gambling, carried out through instruments ranging from measures that can be adopted on equipment to the training of operators of gaming points of sale. The instruments will focus on urgent aspects, such as the recognition and prevention of gambling addictions, avoiding diversified measures adopted by the regions in the past.”

Addressing Concerns About Gaming Locations and Advertising

There is talk of distances from sensitive places and a total ban on advertising: “A study has confirmed the extreme difficulty of average players in distinguishing between legal and unlicensed gaming,” continues the director of the Adm equipment office. “Sensitive places have been used illogically, but also thanks to the reductions in slots in public establishments which, in the last six years, have fallen from over 350,000 to 230,000.”

Shifting Gaming Habits and Revenue Implications

Crucial is the change in gaming habits: “The devices have been declining for several years now, and the pandemic has only accelerated the level of collection with a rather significant reduction in tax revenues because the current situation certainly manifests a reduction in physical gaming and a more than directly proportional increase in the increase in online gaming. This clearly leads as a consequence to the fact that since online games have a lower tax yield than physical ones, revenues have decreased despite increases of 10 billion in collection. The expansion of online gaming is certainly dictated on the one hand by an inevitable change in gaming behavior intensified certainly by Covid. A dynamic that more or less exists in all sectors of the economy, but if we simply refer to the gaming sector, the correlation between the up of e-gaming and the down of land-based is even more direct.”