Founded in 2013, the Oficiul National pentru Jocuri de Noroc (ONJN) is the Romanian Gambling Authority that licenses, monitors, supervises and controls all gambling activities in the country. For many years, the ONJN badge has sat alongside the Maltese Gaming Authority and the Gambling Commission logos on the footer of European-based online casinos as a gold standard of player safety and compliance.
Even major operators began to focus their attention on Romania, with Evoke openly pivoting its company-wide strategy following its acquisition of Winner.ro in 2024. Following a report from Regulus Partners, which claimed the Romanian gambling market is worth €1.1bn ($1.2bn) in net revenue and will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 13% from 2023 to 2026, it seemed like a promising opportunity.
However, recent reports from the Curtea de Conturi Romaniei (CCR) indicate that the ONJN hasn’t been performing as a gambling authority to any sufficient degree.
The ONJN Values and Principles state: "The basic principles of the National Gambling Office are transparency, equidistant and applicability. We aim to a responsible and mature gambling industry, a fair taxation and regulatory framework. We want to establish an open dialogue with all stakeholders for the benefit of the entire industry."
The ONJN
Last year, the CCR conducted a compliance audit, where teams looked at the periods between 2019 and 2023. During this, external public auditors uncovered “numerous deviations” in the Office’s activity, which prompted a full investigation into the ONJN.
“In Romania, remote (online) gambling was carried out without the monitoring, supervision and control of the National Gambling Office (ONJN),” the CCR explained. “The audit of the Court of Accounts at the ONJN found differences in authorisation fees of tens of millions of lei, amounts that were not declared and paid to the state budget.”
It wasn’t a case of the ONJN not ticking relevant boxes for a handful of operators during its time. According to the CCR, “since its inception until now, the National Gambling Office (ONJN) has never monitored or controlled the activity of remote (online) gambling organisers and has not fulfilled its legal duties.”
The main issue was a discrepancy between the RTP rate (return to player) of games and the amount of tax paid to the ONJN.
While Romania does not enforce these limits, most European states set minimum RTP rates from 92%, 90%, 87% or even 85%. This means GGR rates are calculated at values of 8%, 10%, 13% or even 15% (the difference up to 100%) of the total stakes played.
As the ONJN was allegedly not checking whether RTP rates actually matched what operators said, there was a gross misunderestimation of the amounts of revenue and therefore taxes that should be paid.
The ONJN is either incapable or complicit in the harms of gambling. The solution is to limit how much addicts can play – Adrian Giurgiu, USR Deputy
“The risk of organisers setting different RTP values for online games, in fact lower than those declared and calculated based on the indicators in the Monthly Declarations submitted by remote gambling organizers can determine:
- A potential difference in undeclared authorisation fee of up to RON 1.8bn in 2023;
- A potential difference in the undeclared authorisation fee of up to RON 1.2bn in 2022;
- A potential difference in the undeclared authorisation fee of up to RON 0.1-0.6bn, annually, in the period 2019-2021.”
This comes to a total of RON 3.6bn, or just under $1bn.
The response in Romania
At the end of its report, the CCR said it would consider starting criminal proceedings against the ONJN. But that’s just the start of the story.
When this information was uncovered, the response from authorities, politicians and the public was immediate. Save Romania Union (USR) drafted measures to recondition the gambling industry, including a 10% gambling expense cap, new conditions for gambling licences and the introduction of a simplified self-exclusion scheme to replace the system currently used by ONJN.
Adrian Giurgiu, USR Deputy, said: “The ONJN is either incapable or complicit in the harms of gambling. The solution is to limit how much addicts can play. In Romania, gambling expenditures surpass the budgets of key ministries, making the fight unequal. With nearly one million active players, many risk becoming the next tragedy.”
If operators failed to adhere to the new rules, they could be fined between RON 200,000 and 500,000 (between $43,000 and $108,000) if it was their first offence. However, if an operator stepped out of line a second time, the proposed rules would call for their licence to be cancelled.
The USR stated that “new accountability is needed to govern gambling” as “one million active gamblers exceed their income through gambling.”
Several ministers have since supported the gambling expense cap, which would limit a person to spending no more than 10% of their monthly income on gambling.
Romania hasn’t shied away from tackling problem gambling in recent years, even when reactions may seem heavy-handed. In October last year, it banned gambling venues in small towns and villages with less than 15,000 people living in them.
So where next for gambling in Romania?
