Finland’s gambling bill will be brought to parliamentary debate this week, but widely discussed concerns about a potential delay in the rollout of commercial licensing may be confirmed.
The country’s Administrative Committee has presented its report on the government’s proposal to regulate gambling. The committee recommended approving the bill with comments and amendments, including a six-month postponement of its implementation – until 1 July 2027.
The delay is one of many changes to the bill, as its implementation faces difficulties ahead of the originally planned launch in January 2027.
During the postponement period, the committee proposed transferring oversight of the gambling industry from the National Police Board to a new Licensing and Supervision Agency. It also suggested that the licensing procedure and the compensation paid to the state for the exclusive licence, along with several other provisions, should enter into force on 1 March 2026.
In addition, the committee proposes pushing back the application of gaming software licensing provisions by another six months – “so that licence applications can be submitted from 1 July 2027, and from 1 July 2028 holders of exclusive and other gambling licences may only use gaming software from licensed software providers.”
The committee called for monitoring once the law comes into force – to prevent and reduce gambling-related harm, as well as track other development needs. These include implementation processes, marketing, payment and network traffic blocking, prohibitions on gambling outside the regulated system, and preventing competition manipulation.
The committee outlined four proposals to be adopted alongside the bill, which would require the government to:
A plenary session of Parliament is scheduled for 10 December, where the bill and the Administrative Committee’s report will be discussed.
Although the postponement has been proposed and will be debated, Hippos ATG’s Chief Compliance Officer Antti Koivula noted on LinkedIn that some of the proposals reflect “a dissenting opinion submitted by the opposition parties (the Greens and the Left Alliance).”
In a LinkedIn post, Koivula said: “The proposed modifications include raising the gambling age limit to 20, requiring strong two-factor authentication at every single login, banning bonuses entirely, introducing centrally shared deposit and loss limits across all operators, enabling the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health to further tighten the duty of care by decree, and including tobacco style warnings in gambling marketing.
“That’s not all. Not even close.
“It suggests that products falling under the licensing regime should not be marketed on TV or radio, while the prohibition would not apply to the remaining Veikkaus monopoly games; that gambling advertising should be banned at all sports and public events; that the Ministry of the Interior should be empowered to define what constitutes acceptable “moderate” marketing; that marketing should not be directed at anyone under the age of 24; and that the gambling tax rate should be increased to 25.5 percent.
“And there were a few more but I’m sure you got the picture already.”
There are hopes that the opposition voices will be diluted given the sweeping nature of the changes they are proposing to the country’s gambling bill, however, with new elections looming in 2027, it paints an uncertain picture for a market that is already yet to reach its infancy.
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