Domains owned by leading operators including PartyGaming, PokerStars and Chili Gaming may now offer wagers on 28 sports to customers based in France.
Tuesday 29th June 2010
The French national regulatory authority, the Autorite De Regulation Des Jeux En Ligne (ARJEL), has awarded a second tranche of new online poker and sportsbetting licences while also approving 13 new sports on which wagers may be taken.
Among the six operators now licensed to offer online poker and sportsbetting to customers based in France, leading firms PartyGaming and PokerStars are the biggest names while sites run by Chili Gaming and Partouche Gaming France SAS have also been given the green light.
PartyGaming has received clearance for five France-facing sites including PartyBets.fr, GameBookers.fr, PartyPoker.fr, ActPoker.fr and LuckyJeux.fr run in partnership with Electraworks SAS while PokerStars is now licensed for PokerStars.fr, which is operated by its Reel Malta Limited subsidiary.
For their part, Chili Gaming has received clearance for its ChiliPoker.fr online poker domain, which is run in partnership with French telecoms and Internet services provider Gaming Iliad SAS, while Partouche can now offer the game through its Partouche.fr site.
The final license covers sportsbetting and authorises LIL Managers Limited to offer services through its FriendBet.fr social pool-betting site.
ARJEL also revealed that sportsbetting sites targeting French players can now offer wagers on badminton, baseball, billiards, boxing, fencing, ice hockey, swimming, basque pelota, petanque, skiing, boules, taekwondo and sailing, which brings the total number of sports where bets may be taken to 28.
