Melco International Announces 2021 Opening Of Cyprus Casino Resort

Melco International Development Co. Lt announced this week that their casino project located in the Republic of Cyprus will open its doors to the public in the early part of 2021. The site's location will be in Limassol, a coastal city in the southern part of the Mediterranean island.

Melco International is leading a consortium of developers to build its ‘City of Dreams Mediterranean‘ casino resort in Cyprus.

Melco International will not wait till 2021 to run its Cyprus casino as the consortium has confirmed that they have plans to open a temporary casino but are yet to confirm on an opening date. Melco International operators casinos in Macau and the Philippines under the ‘City of Dreams’ banner and will use the same banner to open its first casino resort in Cyprus.

The consortium behind the resort has two main developers working together. The bigger partner is Melco which currently owns a 75% stake in the venture while the remaining 25% is owned by local firm Cyprus Phasouri (Zakaki) Ltd. There was originally a third partner in the consortium, which was US-based Hard Rock International but they backed out after the license was issued back in 2017. We also reported in September 2016 NagaCorp were also interested in bidding for a casino licence but withdrew a few days later.

Ο Φιλελεύθερος / Philenews

The license that the developers received from the Cyprus government is valid for 30 years. The license gives the consortium a 15-year exclusivity on the Island and after which competing licenses will be issued by the government. Included with the initial license is the right to build a satellite casino and three slot parlors.

This will be Cyprus' first casino resort and its largest development in the field of tourism. A total investment of €550 million will be pumped into the casino resort. The final resort will have 136 gaming tables and 1,200 gaming machines. Besides the casino, the property will have a 500-room hotel, 11 restaurants and cafeterias, as well as a wide range of amenities including 9,600-square meter convention facility, retail outlets, a swimming pool and spa.

In a statement, Lawrence Ho, Melco International chairman said

In the same way as we delivered in Macau and the Philippines, we build with local partners, invest in extraordinary world-first architecture and design, create sophisticated entertainment experiences, and embed state-of- the-art technology into everything we do

Market analysts estimate that the resort will be able to attract 300,000 additional tourists annually to the island of Cyprus. This casino resort is expected to generate close to €700 million every year which is nearly 4% of Cyprus’s GDP.