SPAIN Law and Practice Contributed by: Alla Serebrianskaia, Marta de Francisco, Sara Lao and Laura Llorca, Asensi Abogados
initiative, which derives from the obligations set out in Law 13/2011 and Royal Decree 176/2023 on the crea- tion of safer gambling environments, is currently sub- ject to public consultation prior to its final approval. 8. Anti-Money Laundering (AML) 8.1 AML Legislation No specific AML guidance relevant to the gambling sector is available in Spain, nor has anything been published in this regard by the DGOJ or SEPBLAC. Given that the central state has competence over AML regulation, the main applicable AML regulation is composed of: • Federal Law 10/2010 of 28 April 2010 on the pre- vention of money laundering and terrorist financing; and • Federal Royal Decree 304/2014 of 5 May 2014, developing the regulation of the Spanish AML Act. 8.2 AML Requirements The Spanish AML regulation establishes the instruc- tions, proceedings and duties that online and land- based gambling operators need to apply for the pre- vention of money laundering. The main requirements and obligations are as follows. • A suitable manual must be approved for the pre- vention of money laundering and ensuring its avail- ability to SEPBLAC. • Due diligence measures must be applied as per the Spanish AML Act when a customer engages in transactions amounting to EUR2,000 or more – in a single operation or multiple linked operations – either upon the collection of winnings, the wager- ing of a stake or both (for online gambling opera- tors), or at the time of receiving gains or purchase or sale of gaming chips (for land-based operators). The operator should implement the correspond- ing due diligence measures thorough monitoring and investigation into the nature and intention of the business transaction, and not merely through customer ID verification.
• For land-based casinos, identification and docu- mentary verification must be carried out in respect of individuals seeking to enter the establishment. Records of the collected documentation must also be maintained. These establishments must also identify individuals intending to conduct specific transactions including: (a) exchanging of chips for cheques; (b) funding of transfers at customer request; and (c) issuing of certificates regarding customer gains. • Records of the documentation gathered must be maintained in compliance with the Spanish AML Act for a period of ten years, after which the records must be deleted. Five years after termina- tion of business relationships with the customer, the documentation should only be accessible to the operator’s internal control bodies, including its technical prevention units and the legal defence personnel. • A representative must be appointed on behalf of the operator before SEPBLAC. • An adequate internal compliance unit responsible for implementing AML policies and procedures must be established. • Suspicious transactions must be reported, and SEPBLAC must be co-operated with. • A yearly training plan for employees must be approved by the internal control body. • An annual external expert review of the operator’s manual for the prevention of money laundering must be conducted. On the other hand, gambling operators in Spain are subject to dual regulatory oversight, combining both the gambling regulatory framework and the AML framework. These overlapping regimes impose obli- gations related to user identification, fraud prevention, and the monitoring of financial flows. Historically, both the DGOJ and SEPBLAC accept- ed the existing identification systems implemented by operators as compliant. However, during 2025, SEPBLAC clarified that these methods are no longer considered sufficient, stressing that video identifica- tion has been mandatory since 2016 pursuant to the Authorisation of Video Identification Procedures.
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