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The bill 2285-D which was introduced last autumn by Oleg Marusyak, was approved by Ukrainian parliament Verkhovna Rada. The specific gambling bill is the 10th draft of the initial law and is supposed to legalize gambling in the country. 260 lawmakers out of 450, voted in favor of the bill.
The news were hailed by the market since this is a step towards a brighter future and the creation of a fair and transparent market. The Ukrainian gambling market will contribute to state budget and create thousands of jobs, increase tourism and will counter corruption with professional sports. All this once the bill is approved! Gambling taxes will support as well Ukrainian culture.
Ukraine’s newly elected president Volodymyr Zelensky has been promising radical reforms ever since he took charge last year and gambling legalization is one amongst them. The attempt to pass a bill last December failed, since it allowed gambling only at five-star hotels.
The revised and reintroduced bill though approved in the very first reading. In this bill the licence fee for online gambling has been set to 6.7m UAH (approx. £213.000), while casinos that will be located in hotels venues with 200-250 rooms will have to pay 41.7m UAH and 62.6m UAH hotels with 250 or more rooms!
These licensing fees tracking the minimum wage in the Ukraine and adjusting for inflation where need be.
Each licensee would have the rights to open 5 bookmaking shops. 32 bookmaking licences would be available in Kyiv, 16 between Ukraine’s other large cities of Odes and Kharkov and a further 32 in the rest of the country. The number of gambling machines is limited to 40,000 and players must be 21 to gamble, an increase from 18, which it had been in an earlier version of the bill which did not pass when read in December.
