Published on 24 March 2026 • Reading time: 7 minutes
Casino footers list licence names as though they were interchangeable badges. They are not. The gap between an Anjouan licence and a Malta one is not a matter of prestige - it is a difference in what happens to you when a payout is refused. This article sets the main regimes side by side and explains how to verify any of them yourself.
What every licence has in common
Any real licence means three things: the operator is a registered company rather than an anonymous website, it answers to a named authority, and it is expected to run games from certified suppliers whose random number generators have been tested. That baseline matters, and it is the reason the studios behind the games - Pragmatic Play, NetEnt, Evolution, Play'n GO and the rest - will supply a licensed operator and not an unlicensed one.
Where the regimes actually diverge
| Regime | Deposit limits | Independent disputes | Segregated funds | Cost of entry |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Malta (MGA) | Yes | Yes | Yes | High |
| United Kingdom (UKGC) | Yes | Yes | Yes | High |
| Sweden, Denmark, Spain | Yes | Yes | Yes | High |
| Curacao (post-2023) | Partly | Yes | Partly | Medium |
| Anjouan (AOFA) | No | No | No | Low |
Read the second and third columns rather than the first. Mandatory deposit limits protect a player from themselves. An independent dispute body protects them from the operator. Segregated funds protect them from the operator's insolvency. An Anjouan licence provides none of the three, and that is the substance of the difference.
This is not the same as saying an Anjouan casino will not pay. Plenty do, routinely. It means that if one does not, your recourse is the operator's own goodwill rather than a process someone else funds and runs.
Curacao changed, and it matters
For years a Curacao licence meant a master licence resold to sub-licensees with almost no oversight. The 2023 reform ended that: operators are now licensed directly by the Curacao Gaming Authority, with a public register and real reporting obligations. A pre-2023 Curacao licence and a post-2023 one are genuinely different things, and reviews written before the reform describe a regime that no longer exists.
How to verify a licence in five minutes
Take the number from the footer and leave the site
A footer claim is a claim. Note the licence number, the holder company and the regulator, then search the regulator's own register. Never follow the operator's own "verified" badge - on many sites it links to an image rather than a record.
Search by company, not only by domain
Most registers store the root domain a licence was filed under. An operator that rotates numbered mirror domains will therefore fail a domain search while being properly registered under its company name. If the domain search is empty, search the company. If both are empty, that is a finding worth weighing.
Compare the entry to the site
The register names a holder, a licence type and a validity period. All three should match the footer. Check the expiry date specifically - a licence in good standing that runs out next month is a different proposition from one with three years left.
What we found for Felistra
Felistra is operated by Momentum Gaming Solutions Ltd under the Anjouan Offshore Finance Authority, according to two independent casino databases whose entries agree with each other. We searched the Anjouan public register for "felistra" and for "felistragaming" and found no matching record. That is not proof the licence does not exist - the register is indexed by licence number, holder company and root domain - but it does mean we could not confirm it first-hand, and we would rather say so. Our licensing page sets out the full picture, including what the regime does and does not require.
Frequently asked questions
Is an Anjouan licence legitimate?
Yes, it is a real authorisation issued by a real authority in the Comoros. It is also one of the lighter regimes available: no mandatory deposit limits, no independent dispute body and no segregated-funds requirement.
How is Anjouan different from Malta?
Malta imposes deposit limits, an advertising code, segregated player funds and access to an independent adjudicator. Anjouan imposes none of these. The practical difference appears when a payout is disputed and there is no third party to escalate to.
How do I check a casino licence myself?
Take the licence number, holder company and regulator from the footer, then search the regulator's own public register by both domain and company name. Compare the holder, licence type and expiry date against what the site claims.