Good news from across the Atlantic, the French government is yielding to pressure from the European gaming community. The federal entity has become a paladin for free trade and the legalization of cross border gaming.

According to a statement by the European Commission (EC), France used one of the safeguards of free trade regulations to allow its state owned gaming monopoly to survive. The French government said it did not license other European companies in order to protect its citizens from online fraud.

The French government changed its position and will gradually reopen gaming to local and foreign investors. However, poker is not part of the piñata, at least in the short run, instead more traditional types of online gaming such as horseracing and lottery which will be part of the first step towards liberal online gambling.

Complementary laws will be presented to the parliament and are expected to establish a regulatory authority by the end of 2009.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 11th, 2008 at 12:07 pm and is filed under ActionPoker Blog . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.