OPAP, Intralot to sign lotteries contract on Tuesday
The concession contract for the operation of Greece’s state lotteries for the next 12 years will finally be signed on Tuesday, which bodes well for the completion of gaming company OPAP’s privatization.
On Friday the Audit Council approved the contract for the sale of the goverment’s 33 percent stake in OPAP, and if all goes well the state will cash in a total of 842 million euros from the two projects.
State privatization fund TAIPED had made it clear that the deadline for the signing of the agreement for the lotteries by winning bidder Hellenic Lotteries SA (a consortium of OPAP, Intralot and Scientific Games) should be completed by Tuesday, as the validity of the firms’ letters of guarantee expires on Wednesday.
Scientific Games and Intralot, which hold 16.7 percent each in the consortium, secured the procurement contracts they wanted with OPAP before signing the lotteries contract, as OPAP’s board had given its consent by majority, with three OPAP board members expressing reservations.
Each consortium member will get 1.7 percent of Hellenic Lotteries revenues, with Emma Delta, the prospective buyer of the controlling stake in OPAP, qualifying this as excessive as far as Intralot and Scientific Games are concerned.
