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Poland – Century delighted to move on from Poland’s relicensing process

By - 13 August 2018

Canadian-based casino group Century Casinos has said it is pleased to have put the difficult relicensing process behind it in Poland.

The group has been left with eight casino licences in Poland which provides well over a third of the group’s revenues. It has currently six of these eight licences open with two venues operating in the capital Warsaw, including its flagship casino at the Marriott Hotel which gave an average annual revenue increase of 11 per cent over the last three years. The other is the casino at the Hilton Hotel, which has increased its revenues by 15 per cent since its opening over a year ago.

Co CEO Peter Hoetzinger said: “After a rather turbulent few quarters during which the official process for the award of casino licenses came under heavy criticism, especially for its late timing, which not only resulted in several casino closings throughout Poland, but also in lost gaming tax revenue for the government and additional cost and expenses for the operators, our subsidiary Casinos Poland has been awarded a total of eight casino licenses compared to seven we had previously. Six of the eight are already in operation. The other two will open later this year.

“We are really glad that we can finally leave this relicensing mess behind us and look forward to generating much stronger EBITDA margins going forward. Just how strong the market really is may perhaps be demonstrated based by a comparison of the only two casinos that we had in operations throughout this entire licensing, relicensing situation,” he added.

“Our casinos in Poland generated 37 per cent of the company’s total revenue. In USD, revenue was up two per cent for the quarter even though we had three fewer casinos in operation compared to the same quarter of last year. Again, with three fewer casinos in operations, yet we increased revenues. Poland really continues to be a strong market for us.”

The company made the comments whilst announcing its second quarter results which brought operating revenue of $39.6m, an increase of six per cent from the three months ended June 30, 2017. This was driven by strong performances in Canada and Colorado. Canada remains the company’s strongest market, accounting for 38 per cent of its consolidated revenue, increasing revenues by nine per cent and the adjusted EBITDA by 11 per cent.

The two US operations in Colorado contributed 22 per cent of Century’s consolidated revenue with revenue for the quarter growing seven per cent driven by an excellent performance of its Century Casino & Hotel in Cripple Creek.
“We expect to finalize plans for our third expand at that property very soon and look forward to further enhancing our position as one of the leaders in the Southern Colorado gaming market,” Mr. Hoetzinger commented.

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