PAVEL (34) is the manager of a small slot-machine arcade in central Moscow where he has worked for nine years. As he talks, he has one eye on a punter who has been on a winning streak for the past 10 minutes.
Jackpot, the chain that owns Pavel’s casino, controlled more than 200 others across Russia in 2007. At the beginning of June, fewer than half that number were operating, explains Pavel.
By today they will all have closed in compliance with a law backed by prime minister Vladimir Putin that exiles casinos to four Las Vegas-style gambling zones in remote regions of Russia: one each in Siberia, the Far East, the Kaliningrad Baltic Sea exclave and southern Russia.
Their closure means up to half a million jobs will be stripped from the Russian economy, according to unions. The Russian government puts employment in the industry at a widely disputed 60,000.
Glitzy casinos and smaller gambling venues brought a dash of colour to streets and the promise of a quick fortune to owners as well as punters. As oil revenues trickled down to ordinary Russians in the mid-1990s, the number of casinos mushroomed, helped by lax government regulation.
At their peak two years ago, there were upwards of 300,000 slot machines – in comparison, the US gaming meccas Las Vegas and Atlantic City together have about 250,000.
The four planned gaming mega-zones are, for the most part, still greenfield sites.
Construction has just begun on the most ambitious of the four: Azov City, to be built from scratch on what is now a sunflower plantation in southern Russia. The Azov City plan calls for the building of an airport, 50 hotels, shopping centres and dozens of gambling venues.
However roads and sewerage pipes have yet to be laid in the isolated region. Russia’s special economic zone regulator Andrei Alpatov last week admitted that it could take five years before the roulette wheels begin to spin.
Investors are reluctant to contribute to the project. Lavrenti Gubin, spokesman for Russia’s largest casino company, Storm International, says that two years ago, the company was prepared to invest heavily in Russia, but now they are shunning the Azov City project and have instead opened casinos in Belarus and Kyrgyzstan.
Gubin blames the glut of small, shady arcade halls for giving the industry a negative image. “For 15 years there was no regulation,” recalls Gubin. “Casinos operated under their own rules.” He says these crooked outlets fuelled social tensions and that is why the government turned on the industry.
Yulia (25), a pretty blonde cashier in a suburban slot arcade, agrees that the social effects of gambling motivated the decision.
“People lose what little money they have.” One in 10 Russians is now unemployed. Yulia says it is unlikely she will find a job that pays as well as casino work, where she gets tips from lucky punters.
A similar law in Ukraine last week forced the closure of all the country’s gambling venues. The project became the latest in a series of disputes between the president Viktor Yushchenko and the prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko, as the president unsuccessfully vetoed its passage, claiming it will mean the axing of up to 200,000 jobs.
So, will punters grieve the loss of the popular recreation? “Not a bit,” says Volodya (38) as he jabbed at the buttons of a blackjack machine. “I’ve already lost more than one car here.”