Amaya pays €5.9m to resolve PokerStars’ Italian back tax issues

Canadian online gambling operator Amaya Gaming has settled an Italian back-tax dispute related to its flagship PokerStars brand.

On Wednesday, Amaya announced that it had agreed to pay Italian tax authorities €5.9m to resolve the dispute, which involved Stars’ operations in Italy between 2009 and 2014.

The tax claim first surfaced in March 2015, when Italy’s Guardia di Finanza accused PokerStars’ parent company Rational Group of using subsidiaries to “willfully erode” the company’s Italian tax obligations. The taxman estimated that the ruse – which involved assigning Stars’ Italian revenues to other Rational subsidiaries in jurisdictions with lower tax rates – had tried to dodge obligations on €300m in revenue, on which €85m tax was owed.

Amaya says the payment, which includes all amounts owed to Italian authorities for the period in question, officially closes the matter, and Amaya doesn’t face any additional tax liabilities for the 2014 tax year.