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Chile – Chile’s regulator unable to help with Enjoy’s proposals for municipal casino delays

By - 12 May 2020

Vivien Villagrán, Head of Chile’s gaming regulator Superintendencia de Casinos de Juego (SCJ), has said that due to restrictions with legislation, she is unable to help casino operator Enjoy as it looks to delay the development of municipal casinos licences won in the 2019.

Enjoy said it needed at least a three year extension to launch four municipal casinos in Coquimbo, Viña del Mar, Pucón and Puerto Varas.

The operator has said the current economic situation caused by the COVID-19 outbreak have made it impossible for it to comply with the projects committed to in the tender. It also confirmed it is planning a judicial reorganisation to protect its gaming empires in Chile, Argentina and Uruguay, which have now been shut for a month due to the COVID-19 outbreak.

Ms. Villagrán said: “The law is clear and leaves no room for a different interpretation. I have no powers to do what they are asking of me to because there is no provision for that in the Law.”

Enjoy had put forward three alternative solutions: “First, if allowed, the licensing permits to have another tender process. Second, an extension of the current casino licences held in the municipalities with terms for starting projected operations and the new tender processes to begin for a 5-year period. And third, that SCJ authorise an additional extension of at least three years for the start of operations of the four municipal casinos (for which Enjoy won tender bids), a period described by Enjoy as the “minimum period” for its financial recovery.”

Ms Villagrán added: “Enjoy has all the alternatives established by the Law at the stage where they find themselves, and as they have not yet begun operations, they may waive the permit or, eventually, they could dissolve the operating company. It is obvious that the moment in which that happens, the SCJ forecloses on the relevant warranties.”

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