The Lithuanian administration has declared a prohibition on all types of wagering promotion, including promotional incentives, effective July 1st.
The Lithuanian legislature (Seimas) approved a new amendment that will forbid the encouragement of wagering through special occasions, trial games, promotions, price reductions, presents, and other motivators.
The administration stated that the prohibition aims to help address the nation’s gambling issue, lessen the attractiveness of wagering, and decrease spending on it.
The prohibition will apply to both physical and online wagering markets in Lithuania.
While the prohibition will take effect on July 1st, it is already against the law in Lithuania to encourage wagering by providing players with gambling gifts or organizing gambling in unauthorized places or outside of approved operator websites.
Under a law that went into effect last July 1st, operators must also include warnings about the risks associated with wagering in all their advertisements.
Lithuania’s choice to prohibit all wagering promotion follows a poll conducted by the country’s gambling regulator in November, which showed strong public support for a complete prohibition on wagering advertisements.
A recent poll of 1001 grown-ups found that a significant majority (76%) feel that commercials promoting gambling should be decreased, while over half (52%) want them completely prohibited. A smaller proportion (22%) believe that only lottery commercials should be banned.
Nearly half of those surveyed (47%) reported seeing gambling advertisements.
In the past year, at the request of industry groups representing gambling businesses, operators agreed to a temporary halt of gambling ads during the country’s initial lockdown in April due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
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