Dominican Republic Senate advances bill to regulate betting and gaming, with 71,000+ registered shops

The Dominican Republic Senate has approved, in first reading, a bill that would create a formal framework for the authorization, supervision, and control of gambling activities in the country. For PSPs, acquiring teams, and operators, the interesting part is not the politics; it is the attempt to bring a very large cash-heavy betting market under a clearer licensing and compliance structure.

1. The Senate approved the bill with support from 25 of the 28 legislators present during the session. The proposal is designed to regulate all gambling-related activity in the Dominican Republic, including physical and digital operators.
2. One of the bill’s stated goals is to strengthen protection for minors as online gambling grows. The draft includes identity verification mechanisms, advertising restrictions, and specific requirements for which events and objects can be used for betting.
3. The law would also organize and oversee operators working in the Dominican Republic, whether they operate in-person or through digital channels. In practice, that means a more explicit framework for how betting and gaming businesses are authorized and monitored.
4. Guillermo Lama, the senator for Bahoruco province, asked for the bill to be placed on the agenda for debate. The initiative was originally introduced by Senate vice president Pedro Catrain together with senator Félix Ramón Bautista Rosario, and later merged using Catrain’s text as the base.
5. The bill cites the sector’s rapid growth across casinos, sports betting shops, lotteries, and digital betting platforms. According to the Dirección de Casinos y Juegos de Azar of the Ministry of Finance, there are now more than 71,000 registered lottery and sports betting shops in the Dominican Republic, which is the number that usually gets regulators and payment providers to stop treating the market as a side note.