Where is Bovada located? Its operator, license and history

ByCrown Wagers Editorial Team Updated Bovada Help

Bovada doesn’t publish a headquarters address. State regulators address their cease-and-desist letters to Harp Media B.V., a company in Willemstad, Curaçao, while Bovada’s own site says it’s licensed by the Union of the Comoros and the “Central Reserve Authority of Western Sahara.” It started out in 2011 in Kahnawake, a Mohawk territory near Montreal, and today it has no license from any US state.

What Bovada’s own site says

Bovada’s site doesn’t give a street address. You won’t find one in the footer or on its contact and dispute-resolution pages. The closest thing is the licensing line in the footer of every page: “Bovada.lv is licensed and regulated by the Union of the Comoros and the Central Reserve Authority of Western Sahara.” Its terms of service are governed by the laws of “The Autonomous Island of Anjouan – Union of Comoros.”

You reach Bovada by live chat or by email at service@bovada.lv, and it doesn’t list a phone number. Our guide to contacting Bovada has the details.

The .lv at the end of the web address is Latvia’s country-code domain. A domain ending doesn’t tell you where a company is based, and none of the addresses in regulators’ letters to Bovada are in Latvia.

Who runs Bovada, according to regulators

Regulators in Illinois, Massachusetts, Louisiana and Arizona addressed their cease-and-desist letters to Harp Media B.V. as the company behind Bovada. The Illinois and Massachusetts letters give its address as Chuchubiweg 17, Willemstad, Curaçao. Harp Media’s name doesn’t appear in Bovada’s footer, terms of service or dispute-resolution page.

Two other names have turned up. Massachusetts also addressed its October 2024 letter to “Hove Media d/b/a Bovada” in Mutsamudu, on Anjouan. In February 2026, the Illinois Gaming Board wrote to “JuicyPopSlots (Bovada)” at a P.O. box in San José, Costa Rica, with service@bovada.lv among the email addresses on the letter.

In a Kentucky lawsuit over gambling losses, a federal judge wrote in December 2025 that it was “uncontroverted that Harp Media BV possesses an ownership interest in the Bovada websites.”

You’ll see other answers elsewhere. Some review sites say Bovada is headquartered in Costa Rica, others say Kahnawake, and Bovada doesn’t confirm either. The Massachusetts letter also pointed out that Bovada has called itself “USA-based,” but all three addresses regulators have used are outside the US.

The Comoros and Western Sahara licenses

The Union of the Comoros is a group of islands in the Indian Ocean off the east coast of Africa, and Anjouan is one of them. That’s the license named first in Bovada’s footer, and its terms are governed by Anjouan law.

The second license has drawn criticism. Western Sahara is a disputed territory, most of it controlled by Morocco. In September 2025, the financial news site TradeInformer described the “Central Reserve Authority of Western Sahara” as a “phoney regulator” that sells licenses to gambling and financial companies. That report didn’t mention Bovada.

Older reviews that say Bovada is licensed in Kahnawake or Curaçao don’t match what its site says now, which names only the Comoros and Western Sahara.

How Bovada got here

WhenWhat happened
December 2011Bovada launches, taking over US operations as the Bodog brand leaves the US market. Alwyn Morris’s Morris Mohawk Gaming Group runs it from Kahnawake under a Kahnawake Gaming Commission license.
2012US authorities seize Bodog’s domain and indict its founder, Calvin Ayre. The felony charges are dropped in 2017, when Ayre pleads guilty to a misdemeanor.
September 2016The Kahnawake Gaming Commission orders the sites it licensed to stop taking bets from the US. Reports at the time say Bovada surrendered its Kahnawake license and kept serving US players.
2017By Morris’s account, he sells the Bovada brand and website to “a Curacao company” and has had “zero involvement” with the site since.
2023A Kentucky class action seeks to recover players’ gambling losses from Morris Mohawk Gaming Group, Morris, Ayre and Harp Media B.V.
June 2024 to January 2025After a wave of state cease-and-desist letters, Bovada closes to residents of 12 more states and Washington, DC.
Late 2025Vermont and Rhode Island join the blocked list, bringing it to 19 states plus DC. In December, the Kentucky court refuses to dismiss the case against Morris.
February 2026Illinois sends a second cease-and-desist letter, this time to “JuicyPopSlots (Bovada),” and Bodog’s Canadian site is renamed Ozoon.
From court records, state regulators and trade-press reporting. Morris’s account of the sale comes from his filings in the Kentucky case, as summarized by the court.

What this means if you play there

Wherever its offices are, Bovada isn’t licensed by any US state, and the regulators who have written to it call it unlicensed or illegal. That means there’s no state gaming regulator to take a complaint to.

Bovada handles disputes itself. You start with service@bovada.lv, then you can write to disputeresolution@bovada.lv between 7 days and 6 months after the problem started. Its terms send anything still unresolved to arbitration under the rules of an organization Bovada selects, apply Anjouan law, and include a waiver of class actions.

Our guide to whether Bovada is a scam covers the practical risks, where Bovada is available has the state list, and our Bovada review covers its fees, bonuses and payouts.

Only bet what you’ve set aside to lose. If gambling has stopped being fun, call or text 1-800-MY-RESET (1-800-697-3738) for free, confidential help, 24/7, or chat online with the National Problem Gambling Helpline.

Sources

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