Licenses

Holland Casino Wins Five-Year Renewal of Dutch Online Licence

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Holland Casino Online can keep operating in the regulated Dutch market until at least 2031, after the Netherlands Gambling Authority (Kansspelautoriteit, KSA) agreed to extend its online gambling licence by five years, the state-owned operator announced on August 6, 2026.

The renewal takes effect on October 1, 2026, the day after the current five-year licence expires. Holland Casino was among the operators licensed when the Netherlands opened its regulated online market in October 2021, and the extension keeps the state-owned operator on the KSA’s register of approved providers for a second five-year term.

Petra de Ruiter, chief executive of Holland Casino, said the company will keep investing in a safe and responsible online offering where player protection comes first. She paired that with a warning directed at The Hague.

“At the same time, it remains essential that the regulated market is attractive enough to keep players away from unregulated providers, where supervision and protection are lacking,” De Ruiter said in the announcement.

What the licence obliges Holland Casino to do

The licence ties Holland Casino Online to the Dutch supervisory regime for another five years, which means meeting the KSA’s strict requirements on duty of care, consumer protection, and safe play. In its announcement, the company said the extension confirms the regulator’s confidence in how it runs its online offering, and that it will keep working with the KSA, the government, and other parties toward a safe and sustainable gambling market.

De Ruiter’s attractiveness argument is not new for the operator, but it lands at a pointed moment. The Dutch gambling tax rate rose from 30.5 percent of gross gaming revenue in 2024 to 34.2 percent in 2025 and 37.8 percent in 2026, a trajectory Gaming.net reports is making it harder for licensed operators to protect their margins. The Dutch Supreme Court is due to rule in Q1 2026 on refund claims over pre-2021 unlicensed gambling.

A strained regulated market around Holland Casino

The renewal also lands against a wider fight over whether the licensed Dutch market can compete with illegal sites. Gaming.net reported in May 2026 that the Dutch iGaming black market had overtaken the regulated sector in revenue, and the government has since weighed an outright ban on gambling bonuses on top of advertising restrictions already in force.

The KSA, meanwhile, has kept enforcing those restrictions on other licensees. On August 6, 2026, the regulator said it had called out Betcity and TOTO Winkel for breaching the ban on using role models in gambling advertising, after both ran promotions built around recognizable references to professional footballers during the World Cup. Betcity showed betting options next to national-team shirts carrying the names and numbers of well-known players, and TOTO Winkel ran a supermarket promotion referencing Kylian Mbappé’s shirt and number. Both removed the material after the KSA intervened.

Holland Casino’s extended licence runs from October 1, 2026, with the KSA’s duty-of-care, consumer-protection, and safe-play requirements attached for the full five-year term.

Elena Markov is an AI-generated analyst at Gaming.net, tracking regulatory developments, licensing decisions, and enforcement actions in major gambling jurisdictions worldwide. Her reporting centers on specific policy changes, fines, auditor findings, and legal interpretations affecting licensed operators.

Elena’s articles parse regulatory documents and enforcement notices from bodies such as the UK Gambling Commission, Malta Gaming Authority, and state regulators, explaining how these moves influence market access, operator obligations, and compliance costs. She foregrounds named regulators, actual rulings, timelines, and documented outcomes.
Articles authored by Elena Markov are AI-generated and reviewed by Gaming.net’s editorial team to ensure accuracy, clarity, and compliance-aware coverage of gambling regulation.