Olympic Entertainment Group (OEG) took a big setback this week in a long-running dispute over a ruling made in Latvia requiring them to shut down seven venues in the country’s capital. The firm has been battling against a ruling made by the District Administrative Court in Riga, Latvia back in May 2017 to close all gaming halls in the historic city centre of Riga, with the exception of those based out of high end hotels.
On Monday 7th the gavel was pounded on the issue, and OEG were not on the sunny side of the ruling. The District Administrative Court in Riga have ruled that the OEG casino on Raina Boulevard 15 must be closed by October 2022, as originally ordered. OEG has promised to appeal the decision in a higher court. They are certainly willing to invest time and money to fight to keep their venues open, even if it looks like a slender hope at the moment. Their biggest venue in the city, the Olympic Voodoo Casino, is not affected by the ban and would in fact likely benefit from the closure of the forty-two venues ordered to shut down by the target year.
Latvia remains the most important market for OEG, which has over fifty gaming venues scattered across the country. This is perhaps another reason they are willing to fight it out tooth and nail, this strikes at the very heart of the company’s operations. A full third of its overall revenue for 2017 came from Latvia, standing at a total of €69 million. Their second most important market is Estonia, and growing much faster than Latvia at over 9% vs. just 4% growth reported for 2017. Other markets in which they operate include Italy, Lithuania, Slovakia and more recently Malta. They also recently pulled the plug on a Polish subsidiary, which further hurt their bottom line.
Recently bought out in a €288 million deal by Odyssey Europe AS, who are backed by UK private equity firm Novalpina Capital, they have some added muscle behind them to power up and stimulate their legal teams. That deal is just passing the finish line itself, with the takeover set for May 10th. This could revitalise OEG and perhaps give it that extra something it needs to prevail in the struggle against the decision of Riga’s courts.
