After the final statement of the budget plan, the future of the entertainment devices sector is outlined.
In the end, the final text of the plan has arrived. It clashes and is added to the
Dignity decree, already in force since last July. With particular reference to the sector of
gaming machines which, as usual, is the most affected one, with a new and further increase in taxes, but this time with a reduction of the Preu by two percentage points. Here is how the devices sector changes, in the case of new slots and videolotteries.
MEASURES FOR AWPS - With the approval of the 2019 budget plan, and taking into account the previous provisions already in force as a result of the Dignity decree, the rates of the single tax collection applied to the devices become as follow: 20.60 percent of the bets from January, the 1st, 2019; 20.95 percent of the bets from May, the 1st, 2019; 21.03 percent of the bets from January, the 1st, 2020; 21.10 percent of the bets from January, the 1st, 2021; 20.95 percent of the bets from January, the 1st, 2023; This is due to the increase of 1.35 percent expected from the last draft of the text that obtained the vote of confidence and the formal green light by the Senate. But that is not all. As already said, always starting from January 2019, or in just over a week (when, in fact, the tax levy will already rise to 20.6 percent), operators will have the opportunity to intervene on the winning percentage, decreasing it by two points, ie bringing it to 68 percent. However, this is possible only by replacing the current machines in circulation with a new generation of slots, which must however be produced, approved and distributed on the market, given the impossibility of directly intervining on existing machines. So, we can't find the new machines with 68 percent payouts in the premises before next spring. To the detriment of the revenues of operators (managers and operators), that in the meantime will still pay the increased rate. We must also take into account that the replacement of the devices in the premises will still be affected and partly compromised by the lack of permission, due to the limit imposed by the legislator with the 2016 Stability Law but also - and above all - by the existence of many regional regulations limiting or prohibiting new installations.
THE RATE ON THE VLTS – For Vlts is the same thing. Here, the rates of the current Preu, after the increase due to the plan become: 7.50 percent of the bets from January, the 1st, 2019; 7.90 percent of the bets from May, the 1st 2019; 7.93 percent of the bets from January, the 1st, 2020; 8 percent of the bets from January, the 1st, 2021; 7.85 percent of the bets from January, the 1st, 2023. In this case, the increase provided by the law has remained, as in the previous formulation, of 1.25 percent, together with a payout reduction of one percentage point, going from 85 to 84 percent of the bets. However, unlike newslots, it is possible to directly intervene on the payout for Vlts, or anyway more easily, simply having to update the platforms already in circulation today. And even if the decrease in winnings is only one point, it is true that the current average payout of the terminals active in Italy is still higher than 88 percent, therefore far from the minimum limit. This means that for the supply chain the increase will be less expensive than the one on slots. But still important for business purposes.
OTHER NEWS FROM 2020 - It should also be noted that starting from 2020 there are other provisions for new slots, that would require an additional replacement of the devices in the premises. The dignity decree had in fact already provided that "From January, the 1st, 2020, access to entertainment devices (slots and vlts) is allowed only through the use of the health card, in order to prevent access to games from minors", and devices "without mechanisms to prevent minors from accessing the game must be removed from the premises".