Gambling license in Curacao

Curacao rewrote its gambling law at the end of 2024, and the ordinance that replaced the offshore regime is specific about what it wants: a company formed on the island, a director who lives there, staff on a rising schedule, and its own courts for your contract with a player.

The money sits in three places. A handling charge is paid for the application, a supervision right goes to the authority every year, and a second annual right goes to the treasury for holding the licence. All three are printed in the ordinance.

Our other work on the island is on the Curacao page. Weighing regimes against one another belongs with gambling licensing, and the rest of the practice with licensing and compliance.

What you get

• A Curacao company built to qualify: legal form, statutory seat, resident director, ownership chain
• The first phase prepared as an integrity file: owners, qualifying holdings, sources of funds, viability
• A staffing and premises plan matched to the year you are in, and to the turnover exemption if it fits
• Player rules, self-exclusion and complaint handling written to the deadlines the ordinance sets

What the register holds

Gaming licence

The operator authorisation, granted to a Curacao company for remote games of chance. Unless the ordinance says otherwise, it runs for an indefinite period.

Supplier licence

Held by a Curacao company delivering critical services or goods in or from the island. Here the authority decides within eight weeks, extendable by eight more.

Certificate

The separate authorisation the ordinance requires alongside the two licences. Its handling charge is the smallest of the three, at 383 euro.

What the ordinance charges

Handling an operator application costs 4,592 euro, plus 150 euro for each ultimate beneficial owner, 150 for each qualifying holding and 2,551 for each beneficial owner that is a listed company. After the grant two annual rights run in parallel: 22,960 euro to the authority for supervision, 24,490 to the treasury for holding the licence. Adding to the permitted offer costs 13 euro a game, a registered domain or application 250 euro each.

Substance, and the way out of it

For the first four years after the ordinance took effect, a licensee must give permanent full-time work to at least one key person entered in the Curacao population register who is not its director; from the fifth year, to at least three. It must also hold premises of its own on the island for the licensed business. A newer and smaller operator is exempt: incorporated within a year of applying, no beneficial owner shared with another gambling provider for two years, gross gaming revenue under 20 million guilders, and an independent expert confirming it twice a year.

The player contract is Curacao's

The licensee must stipulate that the gaming agreement with the player is governed by Curacao law and that disputes go to the Curacao court. A player may complain free of charge within six months of an incident; you acknowledge within a week and decide within four, extendable once in writing by four. Dispute resolution is offered at your cost, and a player asking in writing to be excluded is excluded for at least twelve months.

Sources: the holder and the resident director — article 2.1; the two phases and their deadlines — 5.1; complaints and self-exclusion — 5.3 and 5.4; law and forum — 5.5; substance — 5.12; charges and annual rights — 5.18 and 5.19, in the National Ordinance on Games of Chance.