In the last few years, French poker sites regulated by ARJEL have experienced diminishing traffic and flagging revenue. Once considered a waning fad that could not be revived, France is now taking another look at the possibility of sharing online poker liquidity with other EU member states. Although it will take a lot of persuading by the proposal’s supporters, passage of the amendment could spell disaster for Winimax.
French poker sites have only been in operation since 2010. Like its fellow EU states of Italy and Spain, France enforces a very strict ring-fenced market. That means that the country’s 66 million residents can only legally access French poker sites with a .FR domain suffix, such as Winimax.fr and Pokerstars.fr. But if supporters of a new proposal get their way, that could change very soon.
A group of 22 parliament deputies have signed on in support of a shared liquidity amendment that would permit French players to access online poker sites regulated by other EU states. The context of the proposal asks that ARJEL “allow an operator that holds a license under section 21 to propose that players registered on the site can play in games with the players on the site of a controlled operator by another authority, one that is a Member State of the European Union.”
Under current law, international players are permitted to access French poker sites, but very few choose to do so because they do not wish to pay France’s high tax rate on winnings. If the new measure is approved, it won’t affect an international player’s ability to access French poker sites, but will give native players the option of accessing some international sites, while continuing to pay the same tax rate enforced by France.
Probability of Shared Liquidity among EU / French Poker Sites
Realistically speaking, there’s not a great deal of hope that the amendment will be approved. 22 sponsors might sound like a good strong number to start with, but they make up just 4% of parliament’s 577 deputies. One such deputy, Economy Minister Emmanuel Macron, says the proposal is taking the wrong approach.
“We are working with the gaming regulatory authority online, ARJEL, which is the authority of these matters”, explained Macron. “It is from this perspective, rather than by a sectorial approach, that we want to address this issue.”
PokerStars in, Winimax out?
For the sake of argument, let’s say France follows through with the consideration to share liquidity between EU states and French poker sites. What could it mean for the rivalry between Winimax and PokerStars in France?
Winimax.fr is the clear leader among French poker sites, averaging 1250 cash game players over the last 7 days, whereas PokerStars.fr is holding steady at 950. If, however, French poker players were able to access PokerStars.eu—the redirected destination for all players logging in from EU member states that aren’t ring-fenced—they would join the world’s largest online poker player pool, averaging 19,000 cash game players.
That could spell disaster for Winimax, but even if the shared liquidity amendment were to succeed, PokerStars might be left out of the mix. The problem is that PokerStars.eu doesn’t just accept players from EU member states. The network consists of an international pool of players from all over the world; everywhere online poker is legal, but ring-fenced markets are not enforced. That fact has the potential to make PokerStars.eu ineligible for access from French poker players.