That’s correct. France is thinking on severe punishment. But there is none in place yet.
You may disagree, but France is now the country that is more likely to have EU Commission giving a favorable prospect for private held companies. Because by far France is the country which has the most abuse on EU exception rules. Holland is the only place that is keeping gambling low profile, according to EU rules. With all the marketing around Euro Millions and the cross border operations of France gambling it would be very difficult for France government to ban gambling based on EU exception rules.
And as you say, France maybe not sticking to EU rules, but there is sufficient protection in Europe for any citizen to deal with that.
Our problem in Europe is that UK is always closer to US than to Europe. If that changes, and UK makes some pressure here, it would be very very valuable, because they are the more advanced country on that matter.