OREANDA-NEWS. September 4, 2008. The authorities of Altay region are negotiating with a number of foreign investors whom they expect to involve in setting up “Sibirskaya Moneta” gaming zone, as it was told by Mikhail Shchetining, Vice-Governor of the region and the head of Central Administration on Economics and Investments.

"We are negotiating with potential investors. But, by your permission, I will not voice their names yet,” said Mr Shcherbinin, adding that the process of the negotiations is not that easy. According to Vice-Governor, “they are quite serious people owning gaming business at a global level”.

It should be mentioned that the negotiations with investors hold before turned out to be fruitless - the representatives of the regional administration regularly announced that Casinos Austria would invest in the gaming zone, and in April 2008 Governor made an official statement that the regional administration was about to sign a framework agreement with the Austrians related to investments in the gaming zone, but then the potential investor suddenly lost interest in the would-be Altay tourism zone (a number of experts explained it by the fact that Casinos Austria was poised to invest in “Azov City” gaming zone).

Under these circumstances some federal experts evaluated the chances to involve external investors in “Sibirskaya Moneta”, with its rather disadvantageous location, as almost equal to zero. The situation with the development of the zone is also complicated by the fact that it faced a tough negative attitude from the public and state bodies of the Republic of Altay (“Sibirskaya Moneta” gaming zone, adjacent to “Biryuzovaya Katun”, is accessible from the Republic of Altay`s territory from the point of logistics).

However, the top management of the region is obviously still hoping to attract foreign investors to the gaming zone, having mysterious negotiations with them.