Curaçao operator ordered to hand back winnings to German gambler

A court in Curaçao has confirmed that an operator based on the island must repay more than €90,000 in losses to a gambler in Germany, as player refund claims in the region begin to mount.

After a series of lengthy appeals and court cases spanning from Europe to the Caribbean, the Joint Court of Justice dismissed an appeal by operator Ngame and ordered it to issue a repayment.

The case dates back to 2023, when a court in the German town of Baden-Baden found in favour of a gambler who had played with Ngame in the grey market.

As the Curacao-based company did not have a local licence in Germany at the time, judges found that the gambling contract between operator and punter was null and void, meaning that the player was owed a €94,999.83 refund.

Lawyers attempted to transfer this judgement to Curaçao in order to collect the debt, which Ngame challenged by arguing that the foreign court decision should be unenforceable.

In 2025 a court found in favour of the German gambler and, finally bringing an end to the legal saga, an appeal by Ngame earlier this month was rejected by the Joint Court of Justice.

Out of order

Judges in Curaçao ruled that, as the island is technically part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, judgements transferred from the fellow European Union nation of Germany are enforceable within its borders.

Ngame also attempted to argue that allowing the refund to go ahead would be counter to the public order of Curacao — an argument which judges rejected.

This tactic mirrors the defence laid out in Malta, where operators based on the European island nation are attempting to block thousands of similar cases, mostly hailing from Germany and Austria.

Malta's infamous Bill 55 passed into law as Article 56A and gives local judges the ability to reject player refund judgements from other EU states on the grounds that to do so would upset the country’s public order.

The logic goes that Malta is so dependent on its online gambling industry that allowing an avalanche of refund claims to land on its shores would be hugely damaging to its economy.

The European Commission and Court of Justice of the European Union appear poised to strike down Bill 55, but well placed legal sources in Malta expect the igaming industry to continue to lean on a public order defence even if Article 56A disappears.

Curacao’s government appears to have no such concerns, perhaps in part because the country has recently reformed its regulations and now at least publicly takes a tougher line on those flouting international gambling rules.

However, the country is yet to face the torrent of claims that have beset Malta over the past five years.

That could be about to change, as Ngame’s case is the second to reach a conclusion in the past few months, following a similar judgment against Raging Rhino N.V. in June.

Legacy issues

NGame had been authorised under the island nation’s former regime, which controversially saw four “master licence” holders sublicence their approvals to thousands of operators.

Several of those operators frequently appeared in enforcement and blacklists in Europe, and the island was accused of harbouring a lucrative illegal igaming industry.

Even the government in Curaçao eventually admitted that it did not know how many operators were licensed under its jurisdiction.

It also acknowledged that it gathered very little in government revenue from many of these operators while they were obscured by the master licence-holders, perhaps again hinting at why politicians and judges in the current day have very little impetus to protect grey and black market operators active during that era.

Ngame’s €90,000 refund claim dates back to the master-licence era, but the company has remained active on the island since then.

According to the most recent list of operators licensed under Curaçao’s new regime, Ngame N.V. was issued a temporary licence that expired in March 2026 and an assessment of its status by the CGA is in progress.