Casinos to Open in Yerevan that Won't Target Vulnerable Populations, Says Pashinyan

During a government meeting today, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan announced that there are signals of hotels being constructed in Yerevan with investments of 100 million dollars or more, which aim to open casinos. Pashinyan made this statement while discussing the legal provision that allows for the establishment of casinos anywhere with an investment of 100 million dollars.

According to the law, casinos can be opened at a distance of 50 km from Yerevan. “As a result of discussions at the Ministry of Finance, we concluded how we would calculate the 100 million dollars in investments. Naturally, the casinos opened in Yerevan will operate on a completely different basis, not targeting the bets of socially vulnerable groups, but will function with a different logic altogether,” said Pashinyan.

He added that they could introduce the project in a few months outlining how the investments will be evaluated to prevent misuse. At the same time, Pashinyan announced that the Revenue Committee and the Ministry of Finance are jointly developing a new system for the accounting and taxation of casinos and winnings. According to him, this is not a simple task as it requires serious programmatic and organizational approaches. “After four years of persistent and prolonged struggle, we are finally managing to regulate the gambling sector. There were visible and invisible resistances related to this,” said the Prime Minister.

Pashinyan also noted that bookmakers and online casinos currently pay an annual fee of 600 million drams, but now they also need to pay an additional fee of 175 million drams for every 100 billion drams wagered.