Curaçao LOK Substance: The Three Key Persons Rule Is in the Statute, and It Starts in December 2028

What the statute requires

The National Ordinance on Games of Chance, the LOK, took effect on 24 December 2024. Three provisions set the local presence a licence holder needs.

Article 5.1(1) limits the Gaming Licence to a Curaçao NV or BV, registered in Curaçao. Article 5.1(4) requires the company to be managed by at least one natural person resident in Curaçao, or by a Curaçao company that is itself managed by one.

Article 5.12(1) then adds three obligations for the holder of a Gaming Licence:

• in the first four years after the LOK took effect, a permanent, full-time job for at least one Key Person, other than the managing director, who appears in the Curaçao Population Register;
• from the fifth year, the same for at least three Key Persons;
• property in Curaçao housing the holder’s own business space, used exclusively for the business under the licence.

A Key Person, in Article 1.1(p), is someone who by name or in fact controls or significantly influences the licensee’s management, its assets, or the approval or implementation of its operating policy. Article 5.12(3) adds that positions the law treats as incompatible cannot be held by one person.

One now, three from December 2028

Period	Key Persons required	Source
24 December 2024 – 23 December 2028	At least one, besides the managing director	LOK art. 5.12(1)(a)
From 24 December 2028	At least three, besides the managing director	LOK art. 5.12(1)(b)

“Appears in the Curaçao Population Register” is the test. A hire who lives abroad does not count, however senior.

The small-operator exemption

Article 5.12(4) switches the whole of Article 5.12(1) off for a licensee that meets every one of these conditions:

• it was incorporated no earlier than a year before it applied;
• none of its beneficial owners is, or was in the two years before the application, a beneficial owner of another provider of remote games of chance or gaming-related services;
• it made less than ANG 20 million in gross gaming revenue in the calendar year before applying;
• it makes less than ANG 20 million a year in its first three fiscal years after the grant;
• it files an independent financial expert’s statement every six months confirming it is still under that figure.

The exemption runs for three fiscal years; from the fourth, the full rule applies. Gross gaming revenue is defined in Article 5.12(5) as stakes received less prizes made available in the same period. ANG 20 million is about USD 11 million at the guilder’s fixed rate of 1.79 to the dollar.

Supplier licences

Article 5.13(2) applies Article 5.12’s first, second and sixth paragraphs to Supplier Licences by analogy. A B2B supplier therefore needs the same local Key Persons and premises. The fourth paragraph, the exemption, is not on that list, so a supplier cannot use it.

What this page said before

Until September 2026 this page told readers that “three key persons” was an expectation from the discussion drafts and that the enacted rule was a resident managing director with a local office. That was wrong on both counts: the resident manager and the Key Persons are separate requirements, and the three-person figure is in the enacted text with a start date. We rewrote the page after reading the official English translation of the LOK published on the CGA’s licensing portal.

The compliance function

The LOK text sets the Key Person and premises rule. In practice, applicants also name a compliance officer responsible for the AML programme: customer due diligence, beneficial-ownership checks, sanctions screening and suspicious-transaction reporting to the Curaçao FIU. The CGA supervises AML compliance in the gaming sector, so this work is tested at application, not after the grant.

How it compares

• Malta (MGA): no headcount and no residency test for key persons; they must be fit and proper and readily available to the Authority.
• Isle of Man (GSC): an Isle of Man-resident Designated Official with personal regulatory responsibility.
• Gibraltar: local management and real operations in Gibraltar.
• Anjouan: no published local staffing requirement.

Curaçao’s rule is unusual in naming a number of local staff and a date when the number rises.

What it costs

The LOK sets the fees but not the payroll. For every fee, the payment dates and a worked first-year bill, see what a Curaçao gaming licence costs.