1 Top-Rated Live Gambling Sites in Honduras

Honduras is a country rife with poverty, and with a per capita income of around $600 it has one of the lowest standards of living in North America.

However, the country's economy has been steadily growing over the past few years, and whilst Hondurans are far from wealthy, the live casino scene in the country is certainly well serviced.

The majority of the population that enjoy live gambling and visiting live casinos visit those based in foreign countries due to the lack of regulation amongst Honduran-based live casinos.

For many years Honduras was part of the Spanish empire and had a strong Catholic ethos. It gained its independence in 1821, but prior to this gambling was officially illegal.

Since then laws around gambling in Honduras have rarely been progressed, with very little in the way of strict guidelines. Officially gambling has been legal since 1977 under the "Ley de Casino, Juegos, de Envite O Azar".

The country has around a handful of large casinos, with nearly all attached to tourist hotels and the majority located in Tegucigalpa, the capital of the country. Online gambling and live casinos have very little if any regulation.

Gambling is a popular pastime in Honduras, although the true extent of its prevalence is hard to accurately estimate, as overtly much of it remains underground.

The update of the gambling regulation in 1977 was the last major overhaul of the gambling laws in the country. However, there have been calls from Honduran politicians to look at the laws with claims the industry is not paying enough tax and is even being used for money laundering.

The long and the short of it is that there is no legislation around operating live casino sites in the country, but likewise, there is no law prohibiting Honduran citizens from playing at live casinos.

A number of surrounding Central American countries do have measures in place, but Honduras has either resisted or simply not gotten around to implementing any laws due to other issues affecting the country.

The murder rate in Honduras remains among the highest in the world and, in the words of the Human Rights Watch, "violent crime is rampant". Across the country kidnapping, rape, assault, and murder are depressingly regular occurrences.

However the country has made good progress in tackling many of these issues, and they are slowly on the decline.

What this does mean is that the law enforcement authorities in Honduras are much more preoccupied with dealing with these matters than with regulating online and live casinos.

It is a long way down a list of priorities for the Honduran Government to deal with, and there is little sign of any movement being made soon.

Whilst Honduran-based live casinos should be treated with suspicion, there is nothing stopping players from using live casinos based in neighboring countries that are officially licensed and regulated such as Panama.

Yes, they are. The aforementioned legislation in 1977, known in Honduras as "Ley de Casinos de Juegos de Envite o Azar" officially legalized gambling.

It is worth noting that since then there have been no further updates to the laws around gambling, which means there have been no amendments to address the subject of online gambling.

As such live casinos remain unregulated, however, Honduran citizens can play freely online and there are a number of gambling sites that accept players from the country.

That said, the proportion of Hondurans that have access to the internet remains below the average for Latin Americans, at around 35%.

There is no doubt that there is a strong influence from North America in the Central American country when it comes to favorite live casino games.

Online slots are particularly popular, especially those with a colorful Latin American feel. Traditionally poker is a very popular game in Latin America, and this is very much the case in Honduras with the game being equally enjoyed amongst men and women.

Soccer in Honduras is hugely loved, to the extent that in June 1969 a qualifying match for the 1970 World Cup between Honduras and neighboring El Salvador led to rioting and, eventually, a war between the two countries that lasted six days.

Needless to say sport, in particular soccer, remains a central part of Honduran life and live sports betting is another popular choice at live casinos in the country.

It seems many Honduran players don't stay too far from the bonuses that live casinos players around the globe tend to prefer.

Matched deposit welcome bonuses remain very popular as do incentivized reload offers. With sports betting being a big draw in the country, targetted bonus offers in that field are well received, including free bets and cashback offers.

The method of currency in Honduras is the Lempira, and unfortunately finding a major betting website that will process transactions in the currency is a challenge in itself.

That, alongside a widespread sense of skepticism of the banking system due to corruption in the country, means that the most trusted methods of payment in Honduras are via e-Wallets.

The benefit of e-Wallets, such as:

• Neteller
• Skrill

This is because they allow players to exchange their local currency for a more established currency, which in the case of Honduras will be the US Dollar.

They also allow pre-paid debit cards to be linked to the e-Wallet, so money can be spent without it ever being withdrawn to a bank account.