by Mario Alfonsi | Published on Feb 15, 2012 | Updated on Feb 15, 2012PokerStars.eu is now up and running for all poker players in Sweden and Finland. Despite the domain change, the new PokerStars site is set up much like the old .com one. The catalyst for PokerStars.eu to be launched was that they received their gaming License from Malta last week.The reason a license from Malta was necessary is because Malta is part of the European Union. Poker players in Sweden who play at sites that are not licensed in an EU country are subject to a whopping 30% tax on their winnings. Players from Finland face the same sort of problems because if they play on a site registered outside the EU they are obliged to report their winnings on their annual income taxes. Before PokerStars.eu, Finnish and Swedish players that chose PokerStars had to play at the .com site which was licensed in non-EU member Isle of Man. Since it was registered outside of the EU, PokerStars.com players from Finland and Sweden were getting absolutely killed with taxes.Now those players who were seeing a large portion of their winnings go to the government are able to enjoy more or less the same gameplay without being subject to any taxes at all. In the future, PokerStars.eu is going to be able to offer these same benefits to players from other nations across Europe as well. Since .eu is a new site many people are under the impression that there will be almost no site traffic, but for game play the two sites might as well be one in the same. By this I mean that even if you are playing on PokerStars.eu, the majority of the players who you are playing against will be playing on the .com site.
