Poland weighs ending Totalizator Sportowy monopoly to unlock gambling potential

Poland's gambling market continues to be shaped by a 2009 gambling law that created state-owned Totalizator Sportowy as a monopoly in several segments, a position strengthened in 2016. The company operates Total Casino, described in the report as the only legal online casino in Poland, a network of slot-machine arcades outside casinos, and online Lotto. Private operators may currently obtain only six-year licences to run land-based casinos or offer fixed-odds sports betting online.

The report says blocking of offshore sites has proved weak, and that authorities recently carried out an operation that led to the arrest of some high-profile influencers, which PressGiochi describes as symbolic. Reforms introduced in 2016 also gave authorities the power to require payment service providers to block payments on a list of illegal gambling domains, but the measure took effect only from 1 September 2026. Compliance requirements include local servers, anti-money-laundering rules and real-time data storage, according to the report.

Taxation is set out in the report at 12% of betting turnover and 50% of gross gaming revenue for casinos, while players pay 10% on winnings; for betting, the tax is deducted automatically before winnings are paid. PressGiochi says the unpredictability of turnover-based taxes leads operators to seek higher margins, making product competitiveness lower than in grey and black markets, which it says still hold about 40% of market share despite controls carried out since October 2024 by the new Department for the Regulation of the Gambling Market and Gambling Taxation.

Private operators including Fortuna, STS, LV BET, Superbet and Betclic have built positions in the regulated market, the report says. PressGiochi reports pressure to end the state monopoly on online gambling, but says the issue is not among the government's priorities. According to H2 Gambling Capital projections cited in the report, total market gross gaming revenue, online and land-based, will reach $4.96bn in 2026 after several consecutive years of double-digit growth; sports betting alone reached GGR of €1.62bn, with forecast gross turnover of €5.07bn.

The report says neither of Poland's two main political parties, the governing centre-right Civic Platform and the opposition Law and Justice, favours the sector's interests, and that Totalizator Sportowy's weight is a factor, contributing $1.29bn to annual state revenue. Radosław Kietliński, an adviser to the management board, said in a speech at the European Economic Congress earlier this year that the probability of liberalisation is low, arguing that the spread of unregulated operators even in liberalised markets undermines the idea that liberalising casinos in Poland would bring significant change. PressGiochi says the next political elections are due next year, with the far-right Confederation party the only one favouring liberalisation.