Land-based gaming groups have added their own calls for ‘urgent’ national action to address online gambling in Spain, as observers cast doubts on the efforts of Spanish regional governments to fill the regulatory void with their own, local controls.

A temporary halt in trading of shares in Spanish gaming group Codere was lifted yesterday as uncertainty continues to surround the company’s future after its principal shareholders said they were unable to pay money owed to former investors. A sale of Codere is now likely, according to one group of analysts, but recent statistics show gaming revenues in its core Spanish market in decline.

Spanish gaming group Codere has confirmed to the Madrid Stock Exchange that deadlocked talks between majority shareholders to resolve their debt obligations to former investors by the end of October could trigger the sale of the 71 percent equity held by the Martínez Sampedro family. But while speculation rages about potential buyers, analysts do not believe a sale can occur in the current financial climate.

Former investors in Spanish gaming firm Codere have triggered a sale of the 71 percent majority shareholding in the group owned by the Martinez Sampedro family, the company’s chief financial officer announced yesterday as third-quarter results showed a decline in earnings from Codere’s domestic business on the back of the wider consumer slowdown in Spain.

Catalan authorities are to schedule meetings with online gaming companies to hammer out new rules that will regulate remote gaming inside Spain’s most prosperous region.

William Hill has announced its ‘gradual withdrawal’ from Spain’s nascent sports betting market as local operators Codere and Cirsa report dwindling revenues from their Spanish machine gaming businesses on the back of the country’s severe economic downturn.

Catalonia makes the largest contribution to Spain's GDP and has regulated the gambling market since 1984. All of the region's casino licences have been granted and a recent cap on the number of slot machine parlours has also been introduced to combat problem gambling. Online games form part of the gaming catalogue, yet this remains a type of gambling which awaits substantive regulation.

The partnership between Bwin and Betbull will become the fourth operational betting shop venture in the Madrid region of Spain, while recent figures released by William Hill and Codere show that football bets have, predictably, proven to be the most popular amongst Madrid residents since the region’s first outlets opened six months ago.

Spanish gaming giant Cirsa has told the Spanish media that it has signed a deal to supply the Chinese government with technology for a bingo hall pilot scheme set to be launched in the province of Tianjin.

A ‘mixture of uncertainties’ both economic and regulatory has led William Hill and Codere to jointly review plans to expand their nascent Spanish sports betting operation. The news comes as Madrid-based Codere warned of an ‘unprecedented’ slowdown of consumer spending in the country that was greatly impacting its Spanish gaming machine business.