A court in Kyiv, Ukraine, has ordered the liquidation of the Premier Palace, formerly one of the capital’s best-known casinos.
The ruling comes as gambling sector chiefs warn that the size of the country’s illegal betting industry has swollen to $1.4 billion.
The Kyiv Commercial Court issued the Premier Palace order, putting an end to a long-running bankruptcy case, the Ukrainian media outlet Antikor reported.
Public officials launched a case against the Premier Palace operator in May 2024. A court-appointed trustee spent several months searching for assets it could use to pay off creditors.
Most of the creditors hail from the public sector, with the casino raking up over $8.5 million in fines and unpaid energy, rent, and tax bills.
The biggest Premier Palace Casino creditor is the state gambling regulator PlayCity, with Premier Palace owing the government body around $3.5 million.
Premier Palace Casino Bankruptcy Finally Official
The court’s presiding judge ordered bailiffs to terminate property disposal and start the liquidation process.
The casino is now officially bankrupt, with all business activities ordered to halt.
The judge appointed an insolvency administrator as a liquidator, instructing him to sell off all remaining casino assets by mid-2027.
Most of the creditors are likely to walk away almost entirely empty-handed, the media outlet wrote.
The proceeds from the sale of the casino’s “furniture and equipment,” it wrote, are unlikely to be enough to cover the casino’s multi-million dollar debts.
The ruling marks the end of an era for the Ukrainian casino industry. The casino was part of the Premier Palace Hotel complex, near Khreshchatyk.
The latter is the city’s business and most central street.
End of an Era
The Premier Palace Casino was the first land-based casino to receive an operating gambling license after Ukraine legalized the gambling sector in 2022.
Meanwhile, Ukraine’s leading gambling industry body says a recent survey of 2,500 residents has found that 81% of people in the country have placed an illegal online bet in the last three months.
The size of the illegal sector has grown to $1.4 billion, said Oleksandr Kohut, President of the Association of Ukrainian Gambling Operators, the Ukrainian media outlet NV reported.
Kohut said the size of the illegal market, in proportion to the legal sector, has grown by 4.6% in the past 12 months.
“The results are significantly worse than we expected,” said Kohut. “The current trend is clear. The unlicensed segment is growing aggressively and continues to take business away from the legal market. Ukrainian players continue to migrate to the gray zone.”
The survey found that most illegal-sector gamblers said they thought unregulated casinos provide faster payouts. Around 6% said they said they preferred illegal casinos because these platforms let them place bets in cryptocurrency.
Industry Chief’s Warning
Kohut called on the government to ease regulations on legal operators and focus on cracking down on the illegal sector.
“If the status quo continues and the [government] continues to suppress the legal market under the guise of combating problem gambling, the market will accelerate its shift toward illegal operators,” he said.
Ukrainians will continue to “migrate en masse” to the unregulated sector, he said, “and the state will lose tax revenue.”
The same body has also refuted claims that gambling has become a problem in the military.
In March, it said a survey of soldiers found that military personnel gamble “no more than the average Ukrainian.”
The association was speaking after politicians called for a blanket ban on gambling in the Ukrainian Armed Forces.
Earlier this month, a court ordered a Ukrainian female post office worker in the Tyachiv District Court of Zakarpattia to serve two years of probation.
The officer stole money from pensioners in the district and spent the cash on online casinos.
