Some of you may have seen the news last week about Betfair withdrawing its services from Portugal.
The withdrawal came after Portugal started to operate under a new online gambling regime.
Several Portuguese traders have contacted me over the last week or so. It’s quite surprising to see how many people this affects. Quite sad too…
Email Contact: From Portugal
One trader, in particular, emailed me to ask where would be best to live in the UK. With the amounts of money available from the Betfair markets, it’s not all that surprising, I suppose. If that’s the case for you, all I can say is—be prepared to be disappointed by the weather!
Hopefully, there will be further changes, although it doesn’t look all that likely at the moment. Betfair must be feeling the pinch a bit too, as I’m sure there are many Premium Charge-paying customers in Portugal, mainly from trading football. My first thoughts were of Paulo Rebelo, although others were quick to point out that he comes to the UK to trade regularly anyway. For those who speak the language, I don’t doubt there will be plenty of insight from him on his forums and website.
With several countries having now changed betting taxes to focus on turnover instead of revenue, it does leave one wondering. It seems extremely unlikely that this would happen in the UK any time soon, although it’s something to think about in the longer term, I suppose.
It leaves an interesting question for those who trade full or part-time on Betfair, topping up their income to a noticeable level:
What would you do if Betfair were to disappear tomorrow? Or, if it has happened to you recently, what do you plan to do now? (Comment below!)
12 thoughts on “Betfair: Situation With Portugal…”
I live in Portugal and as a PC trader i dont have much of a choice right now but to leave the country. This government made a pretty mess with us traders, as it did with a whole generation that is taking planes to live somewhere else. At the time i´m really considering returning back to forex trading. For us traders, there are plenty of markets to trade from (forex, stocks, bonds, commodities, futures, index, etc..). So, i´m not worried if betfair disappears.. I´m more worried that some governments dont!
Simply set up a vpn in a country not affected. Job done
Hello,
A friend of mine told me that some professional traders use a VPS to trade. Do you use a VPS? If the answer is positive could you tell me which you use and why?
Hi. Can you tell me please if it’s sure that Betfair access will be restricted also for Romania next month? I’m really worried about this, i know Betfair has a big center here, where they develop some software. Hope they will take the gambling license, even though I don’t know if this counts
Hi there, I couldn’t possibly know if it will or will not actually happen yet. Sorry.
Hey, Caan. Good to see you mentioning the situation in Portugal.
I’m a part-time trader on Betfair and, although I was already thinking of moving to the UK due to family and professional reasons, I ended up speeding things up because of the mess brought on by the new gaming legislation in Portugal. Betfair has applied for a license with the Portuguese government, but the Exchange markets are suspended until further notice and, due to some very clever intricacies in the legislation that were pushed through by the government under the influence of a very powerful gaming institution in Portugal (Santa Casa da Misericórdia), I honestly believe that Exchange markets will never reopen in Portugal.
I was fortunate enough to be able to move to England and continue with my trading activities, but there are loads of traders in Portugal that depend on the extra income from their trades to help family members with bills and medical expenses (I personally know two such cases). It’s really sad because these traders don’t make enough money with their trades to afford a move to another country, but the money they do make has a tremendous impact on their quality of life. All in all, it’s a rather sad situation.
Anyway, keep up the good work, Caan. It’s good to see bonafide traders share valuable information like you do, especially with your videos. Cheers! 🙂
Good Luck Eduardo 😉
Cheers, dTrader. All the best to you as well. 🙂
My suggestion to the portuguese people. Move down here to Brazil. We still don’t have regulations that prevent betfair or any other sportsbook to operate. Actually, I doubt it will ever happen. At least Language is not ganna be a problem…
I live in Portugal and use Betfair using SAFER VPN its very reliable only costs $57 for first year then $76 per year after that can also get all your catch up TV with it as well there are some free VPN sites but the yend to cut off on a regular basis this one has never let me down
Hey roddy
Do you still trade with potugal account using VPN? Does BF not have a problem with it?
QUESTION: BETFAIR HAS CLOSED THE BETFAIR EXCHANGE IN AUSTRIA – SPECIAL QUESTION: IS THE BETFAIR EXCHANGE AVAILABLE IN HUNGARY – BECAUSE I HAVE A HOUSE IN HUNGARY AND I COULD USE THEN THE BETFAIR EXCHANGE THERE! ( I AM NOT INTERESTED IN THE BETFAIR SPORTSBOOK)!