Finland’s new iGaming law bans affiliate marketing just as the licensed market prepares to open in 2027

Finland’s National Police Board began accepting licence applications on March 1, 2026, and by September 22 had received 75 submissions, up from 50 in June, with Veikkaus and Unibet among the applicants. One company can file more than one application, so the actual number of operators involved is lower than the headline figure suggests. Wildz Group, founded by Finnish iGaming executives and formerly operating as Rootz, says it became the first operator to receive a licensing go-ahead, citing an NPB letter dated October 15, 2026 that grants a five-year licence starting July 1, 2027. The regulator hasn’t published an official list of approved operators, so the claim currently rests on the company’s own announcement rather than confirmed regulatory record. A second licence was announced separately on October 19 by Hippos ATG, a joint venture split 50/50 between ATG and Suomen Hippos, with dividends divided 60/40 in Hippos’s favor.

A B2C licence costs €29,000, with no cap on the number of operators and no application deadline, and review takes six to eight months. Software suppliers face mandatory B2B licensing from July 1, 2028, with applications opening a year earlier. Operators will pay 22% tax on gross gaming revenue plus an annual supervision fee, and the law bans cryptocurrency and credit-funded play while introducing a unified self-exclusion system modeled on Sweden’s Spelpaus. As of May 2026, international platforms already held roughly 40% of search demand in the market the new licences are meant to bring onshore.

The clause that matters most for affiliates bans affiliate marketing and influencer promotion outright, and operators are limited to their own social media accounts that have to stay non-interactive, no likes, comments, or influencer-driven engagement. But the wording isn’t as airtight as that summary makes it sound. Antti Koivula, a gambling-law specialist who now serves as Hippos ATG’s chief compliance officer, has pointed out that Section 51 of the law leaves room for interpretation on what actually counts as affiliate marketing, and Casino Guru’s Simon Vinzce has warned that sites could lean on exactly that gap, arguing they’re informing rather than promoting to keep operating in a gray zone. Not every lawyer reads the ban as closing the door completely either. Pia Ek of Bird & Bird has argued affiliates will likely find new ways into the market, calling the law “not doomsday” rather than an outright shutdown of the channel. Welcome bonuses and VIP programs get hit hard regardless of how the affiliate question shakes out: only moderate offers to existing customers are allowed, and bonus size can’t scale with how much a player wagers. Finland isn’t the only market where regulators are tightening the screws on affiliates specifically, the Netherlands has been moving in a similar direction through its own whitelist push.

Enforcement against marketing that crosses the line is already running well ahead of the 2027 launch. The NPB has reportedly told Wildz to stop all Finland-facing marketing or face a formal ban backed by fines, pointing to Instagram posts by former alpine skier Kalle Palander and suspected violations on other Finnish-language sports sites; Wildz says it’s in open dialogue with the board and has complied with every request so far. Even the state monopoly hasn’t been spared: the NPB fined Veikkaus €2.9 million and imposed a three-month marketing ban over ads reaching minors. On the influencer side specifically, the Helsinki Administrative Court has already upheld NPB bans and conditional fines against streamers for promoting non-Veikkaus gambling on Twitch and YouTube, including a €33,000 conditional fine in one case and a reduced €25,000 fine in another after old promotional clips were found still online. That’s the enforcement track record the incoming affiliate ban will be layered on top of, not a clean slate.

Market participants estimate affiliates currently drive 50% to 90% of casino customer acquisition in Finland, which is why the restriction lands as hard as it does on operators who’ve built their growth around that channel. Mika Kuismanen, head of the Finnish Trade Association for Online Gambling, has warned that cutting off affiliate marketing and tightening bonus rules at the same time risks pushing Finnish players back toward unlicensed, offshore sites rather than the newly licensed market, undermining the exact channelization the reform is supposed to achieve. Koivula himself has said he expects the rules, affiliate restrictions especially, to loosen if channelization toward licensed operators comes in below target once a new government takes office in summer 2027.