French gambling firms have been issued a conditional warning to ensure anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing (AML/CFT) guidelines are being followed and reported on.
The warning comes from the country’s gambling authority, the Autorité Nationale des Jeux (ANJ), which has been forced to remind licensed operators of their AML and CFT obligations.
The notice follows the first referral by the ANJ of a licensed gambling operator to France’s National Sanctions Commission (NSC) in 2025.
The case concerned failures relating to asset-freezing commands, including inadequate internal procedures to notify authorities of suspicious transactions.
The National Sanctions Commission upheld the breaches and imposed a €20,000 fine and a suspended two-month operating prohibition on the operator.
A former executive received a €20,000 fine and a suspended two-month management ban, while a senior compliance figure was fined €5,000 and received the same suspended restriction.
The Commission ordered the decision to be published anonymously, yet in further disclosures it was reported that the offending party was understood to be Betsson France, which had set up in France by 2024.
The ANJ reminded all licensed operators that they must maintain adequate systems, staffing and internal procedures to identify customers and entities subject to asset-freezing measures.
Operators must prevent designated individuals from opening accounts or placing bets and immediately freeze funds when a restriction is identified after an account has been opened.
Any applicable asset-freezing measure must also be reported immediately to the Minister for the Economy.
The regulator warned that its AML/CFT inspections will intensify. Operators should therefore review their customer-screening controls, escalation procedures, staff training and reporting arrangements to ensure that asset-freezing measures can be implemented without delay.
It follows similar measures issued in the UK by the Gambling Commission, which has tightened its governance over AML in the last few months.
This has resulted in three operators – Bet St George, BresBet and Ken Howells – having their licences suspended due to AML failures. QuinnBet was also fined upwards of £600,000 for similar failings.
AML alert system
The ANJ is revising its AML procedures to improve operators’ alert systems and strengthen due diligence checks on higher-risk customers, particularly individuals whose occupations may expose them to corruption.
Operators have also been instructed to improve customer risk classification, internal controls and the quality of suspicious-transaction reports submitted to TRACFIN.
Alongside its AML reforms, the regulator has launched a separate algorithm designed to identify excessive or pathological gambling.
The tool assesses players against 23 financial and behavioural indicators, including account transactions, playing frequency, use of gambling limits and previous interventions.
It will provide the ANJ with a common benchmark against which operators’ detection systems can be assessed.
The projects will now be overseen by Pascal Chèvremont, who was appointed President of the ANJ in June 2026, succeeding the regulator’s inaugural president, Isabelle Falque-Pierrotin.
Chèvremont inherits an expanded supervisory programme in which data-led monitoring, player protection and the fight against financial crime have become central priorities.
