Chilean casino operator Dreams has filed a legal challenge against the country’s gaming regulator after being excluded from the renewal process for the Coyhaique casino license.
Through its subsidiary Casinos de Juego Coyhaique, the company submitted a complaint before the Santiago Court of Appeals against the Superintendencia de Casinos de Juego (SCJ), seeking to overturn the resolution that disqualified its bid.
The SCJ rejected Dreams’ administrative appeal, finding that the company failed to submit required documentation during the tender's technical evaluation phase.
According to the regulator, the application lacked tax compliance certificates issued by Chile’s Internal Revenue Service (SII) for several shareholders and directors linked to the entity, along with tax declaration forms and financial debt certificates for shareholders including Claudio Fischer and Sebastián Fischer.
Dreams disputes the decision, arguing the exclusion was unlawful, arbitrary and disproportionate. The company maintains it submitted requests for the SII certificates within the required timeframe but that the tax authority can take up to six months to issue them, making it effectively impossible to comply with the tender’s deadlines.
The filing included proof that the requests had been submitted before the evaluation period ended.
The company also challenges the SCJ’s interpretation of the concept of “consolidated ownership.” Dreams argues the term is not defined in Chile’s gaming law nor in the tender’s terms of reference, and that the regulator therefore improperly demanded personal financial documentation from individuals who are not formally part of the applicant entity.
Dreams was not the only bidder affected. Both companies that submitted proposals for the Aysén Region license, Casinos de Juego Coyhaique and Sociedad Río Simpson, had their technical offers rejected by the regulator, preventing the process from advancing to the economic evaluation stage.
Dreams is now asking the court to annul the resolution and order the reinstatement of its technical offer so the tender can proceed.
Chile recently launched a new tender for casino licenses in Coquimbo, Viña del Mar, Pucón and Iquique
