Riccardo Pedrizzi proposes higher AWP payouts and lower PREU
Regulation3 min read
In brief
- Riccardo Pedrizzi proposed a five-percentage-point rise in AWP payouts with a matching cut in the PREU levy.
- He presented it as an alternative to a one-percentage-point PREU increase under consideration for the 2027 budget bill.
- Pedrizzi said the aim is to recover demand lost to other products, particularly online, not to raise overall player spending.
- He cited the 2015 SuperEnalotto changes, which raised its prize share to 60%, as a precedent.
Riccardo Pedrizzi has proposed raising the payout rate on AWP machines by five percentage points while cutting the PREU levy on AWP and VLT machines, as an alternative to the PREU increase in Italy's 2027 budget bill. He set out the proposal in an analysis published in the newspaper La Discussione. A one-percentage-point rise in the PREU is under consideration, the article reports.
Pedrizzi said the change is not intended to raise players' overall spending but to recover part of the demand that has shifted to other products, particularly online. He said the progressive decline in AWP collection is a problem for companies and for the state, given the tax contribution the machines have historically provided. Confirming the assessment would require analysis of the effects on gambling behaviour and on tax revenue, according to the article.
As a precedent, the article cites the SuperEnalotto. Article 1, paragraph 650, of law 190/2014 allowed intervention on the economic and regulatory parameters of games where collection and revenue losses were significant, to protect the value of public concessions. On that basis, a ministerial decree of 18 September 2015 raised the SuperEnalotto prize share to 60% and introduced new prize categories. Pedrizzi said a similar approach could be taken for AWP machines through legislation combining company sustainability, product competitiveness and protection of state revenue.
Pedrizzi linked the blocked reform of land-based gambling to what he called a "metodologia del bunker", meaning that consultation was not opened to all parts of the sector, research centres and industry experts. He also cited divisions between the regions, fragmented operator representation, prohibitionist positions and political difficulties as the legislature nears its end. The result, he said, is the prospect of further extensions of bingo, betting and gaming machine concessions without uniform rules on distances from sensitive locations, opening hours and player protection, which he said risks more disputes with local authorities and indirectly favours the illegal market.
The article also reports recent remarks by Massimo Garavaglia, president of the Senate Finance and Treasury Committee, and by Mario Lollobrigida, central director of games at the Agenzia delle Dogane e dei Monopoli. Garavaglia, speaking at a conference promoted by the Lombardy regional council with CORECOM, drew attention to the greater controllability of machines in physical venues compared with online platforms and stressed transparency and information in player protection. Lollobrigida, at a conference organised by ACADI, raised "un aumento del payout degli apparecchi da gioco, accompagnato da una riduzione del Prelievo erariale unico", referring to a proposal already put forward by concessionaires and technicians and considered potentially sustainable for tax revenue.
The article gives no appeal status or response from the government or the Agenzia delle Dogane e dei Monopoli to Pedrizzi's proposal. It states that the reform of land-based gambling was left out of the implementing measures of the tax delegation after the 29 August deadline.