Poker in Ecuador: casinos are banned, and voters said so twice

Ecuador is the only country in South America where voters have twice chosen to keep casinos closed — once in 2011 and again in November 2025. That decision shapes everything about poker here.

Casinos are prohibited, by referendum

Land-based casinos have been banned in Ecuador since a 2011 referendum in which 52% of voters backed closing businesses dedicated to games of chance. The prohibition sits in Article 236 of the Comprehensive Organic Criminal Code, which carries sentences of one to three years for operating such an establishment.

That was not the end of the argument. A **referendum in November 2025 proposed reopening land-based casinos and was rejected**, reaffirming the ban. Ecuador has now voted on this twice in fourteen years and given the same answer both times.

Online is a different question, and only partly settled

Online sports betting has travelled a separate path. In December 2019 the State Attorney General's Office concluded that "sports forecasting" is not gambling in the strict sense, because outcomes depend on the bettor's knowledge rather than pure chance — a distinction that left the activity in a grey area for years.

That was formalised by the Organic Sports Law, approved on 19 December 2025 and effective 11 February 2026, which granted legal status to online sports betting.

**Poker is not sports betting.** The law that legalised one did not legalise the other, and the casino prohibition has not moved. Ecuadorians who play online poker do so outside any domestic licensing framework, on international sites. This is general information rather than legal advice, and given how fast the position has moved in the last year it is worth checking before relying on it.

Tax

In April 2026 Ecuador's tax authority (SRI) established that sports betting, sports forecasting and online gaming services attract **15% VAT**, applied regardless of where the operator is based — the test is whether the user is in Ecuador. The model mirrors how Ecuador taxes foreign services like streaming subscriptions.

The player

Ecuador has produced exactly one player of note, and his record tells the story of a country with no domestic scene. Pablo Valdivieso tops the national list with $884,489, built almost entirely from sub-$500 WSOP Circuit and RunGood events in the southern United States. He is more than double the next Ecuadorian on the list, and he lives in Jacksonville.