The “one-armed” deported to the provinces
The opposition of Russian authorities and gaming operators ended with a rout of the letter. The sentence to casino and slot machine parlour owners was announced just before the New Year, by the State Duma deputies who in three readings adopted the law under which from 2009 all casinos and slot machine parlours will be moved to four reservations set up in the nether land far from residential areas.
The reason to start tackling the issue in a serious way was given by law enforcement bodies’ October inspections of a number of Moscow casinos, the owners of which were announced to be some Georgian authorities. Then, on comparing casinos with “alcoholization of the population”, Vladimir Putin announced the final solution of the gambling matter and offered the parliament members his own legislation draft. The essence of it was boiled down to evicting gambling facilities to four special zones.
The deputies got the cue and just before the New Year gave the market a “present”, having managed to adopt in three readings the law “On state regulation of activities involved in gambling organization and arrangement”. The other day the law has been approved by the Federation Council. The gaming reform will have two stages. From July 1st, 2007, the restrictions supposed to contribute to the concentration of the business will come into effect: net assets of a gaming operator shall be no less than 600 mln rubles, the minimum area of a casino - 800 square metres, of a slot location – 100 square metres; gaming equipment shall be owned by the operator, the minimum number of gaming tables being 10, slot machines – 50, and the technically installed winning percentage shall be no less than 90%; the age quota for visitors and employees is 18 years of age. The facilities which fail to comply with these requirements will be closed. Under the legislation, gaming business licenses will be issued by an empowered federal authority (still it is not clear which exactly: since Rossport was deprived of this right on December 31st, 2004, licenses have been issued by no one). Gambling in the Internet and via mobile phones is completely banned. From July 1st, 2009, all Russian gambling facilities shall be in four zones: In Kaliningrad, Altay, and Primorie regions and on the border pf Rostov and Krasnodar regions. As the Vedomosti was explained by Vladimir Medinski, deputy head of the State Duma relevant committee, selecting the regions, first of all they had based on the desire of local authorities
The market as not appreciated the innovation – no operator has agreed to move to a reservation so far. “The timeframes are unreal. And investments must be enormous,” says Boris Belotserkovsi, a co-owner of Ritzio Entertainment Group. “A lot of things should be taken into account: the time for getting a new license, for developing a new project, for obtaining required permits and agreements for construction, the construction itself, forming the infrastructure; I believe it will take at least five years”, he is supported by Michael Boettcher, President of Storm International.
Gaming market leaders decided to diversify the business, even before the reforms. “Unicum”, a manufacturer of slot machines, launched production of vending machines and service payment terminals, SmartGames – electronic games-simulators, Rosgame is going to invest in real estate. And Oleg Boyko, a co-owner of Ritzio Entertainment Group, is planning to take about $2 bln out of gaming business and iinvest them in a chain of shops.
The initiative of the authorities made even the world market giants hold on. It is not clear what will happen to the contract between Publishing and Broadcasting (PBL), which belongs to the richest Australian family, the Parkers, and Crocus Group of the Agalarovs family, under which PBL would be assigned a manager of over 24 000 square metres for a casino in one of the centres under construction. And Moscow region government, most probably, will not be able to follow its obligations under the contract with a large South-African company, Sun International, on building the “Parkland” complex for $2 bln, which has been supposed to include as many as several casinos.
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