President assents to Gambling Duties Act 2022

President Halimah Yacob assented to the Gambling Duties Act 2022 on 8 February 2022, according to the Act as published in the Government Gazette Acts Supplement¹. The Act was passed by Parliament on 10 January 2022 and published in the Acts Supplement on 16 February 2022¹.

The Act is described in its long title as "An Act to consolidate the law on levy and collection of duties on lawful betting and lotteries and to make related amendments to the Casino Control Act regarding casino taxes and casino licenses, to repeal the Betting and Sweepstake Duties Act, and to make consequential amendments to certain other Acts"¹. It establishes a tax called a gambling duty, which the Act states is charged "For the purpose of ensuring that the public in Singapore obtains reasonable net benefits from the lawful conduct of gambling in Singapore"².

The Act sets out who owes the duty. Gambling duty on betting received, paid, negotiated or settled in the course of betting operations is payable by the authorized betting operator; duty on a lottery promoted by an authorized lottery promoter is payable by that promoter; duty on keeping a gaming machine in non-casino premises is payable by the person keeping it; and duty on a gaming service provided by an authorized person in the course of a relevant business is payable by that authorized person². Where more than one person is liable, the Act states "they are each jointly and severally liable to pay the gambling duty payable"².

Its definitions are broad. "Betting" means making or accepting a bet on the outcome of a race, competition, sporting event or other event or process, the likelihood of anything occurring or not occurring, or whether anything is or is not true¹. A bet includes "a free bet, which is a bet made wholly or partly using an amount that is provided to the person making the bet by the authorized betting operator with whom the bet is made and is not immediately redeemable by the person for cash"¹. "Money's worth" includes "virtual credits, virtual coins, virtual tokens, virtual objects or any similar thing that is purchased within, or as part of, or in relation to, a game of chance"¹. A "game of chance" includes a game that is partly a game of chance and partly a game requiring skill¹. For lotteries, "it does not matter whether the lottery is held, drawn, exercised or managed wholly in Singapore or partly inside and partly outside Singapore"¹.

The Act provides for penalty tax on unpaid duty: 5% of the amount not paid, a further 5%, and a further 5% for every complete month the duty remains unpaid, with total additional penalty tax capped at 50% of the outstanding gambling duty². An assessment or reassessment generally "must not be made more than 5 years after the end of that period", though the Commissioner may assess at any time to make good a loss of duty attributable to fraud or wilful default².

What it means for players

The Act taxes operators, promoters and gaming service providers, not individual punters: liability falls on the authorized betting operator, authorized lottery promoter, gaming machine keeper or authorized person, not on the person placing the bet². Its definitions reach free bets and virtual credits, coins and tokens bought in or around a game of chance, so products built on those mechanics fall inside the duty net¹. Casino license holders are excluded from the definitions of authorized betting operator and authorized person where the activity is covered by their casino license, and casino taxes and licenses are dealt with through related amendments to the Casino Control Act¹. The Act does not set out duty rates; the rates are prescribed separately, and the sources do not state them².

What happens next

The Act commenced in two stages, on 1 March 2022 and 29 July 2022¹. Wikisource records that the uncommenced section 43 was repealed by section 49 of the Gambling Regulatory Authority of Singapore Act 2022, and points to the Gambling Duties Regulations 2022 (S 627/2022) for the tax rates of gambling duties². The rates themselves have not been reported in these sources.

For how this fits with the wider framework, see Gambling Laws in Asia: What Is Legal in 12 Jurisdictions and Recent and Pending Gambling Law Changes in Asia, and for the local picture, Can I Gamble in Singapore?.