The Commerce Commission today cleared Sky City Limited to acquire up to 55% of the shares in Riverside Casino Limited.

Riverside is the applicant for a casino premises licence for the proposed Hamilton casino.

Commission Member Dr Kate Brown said that it had been necessary to decide if the relevant market was casino entertainment, or whether casinos were part of a wider market. A variety of views had been considered, but it had been concluded that the distinctive characteristics of casinos made a separate casino entertainment market appropriate.

Another major issue was whether casino patrons in Auckland and in Hamilton would be likely to see the two casinos as substitutable. Dr Brown said that the Commission had noted that overseas and New Zealand experience is that most casino patrons are "locals" rather than national or international tourists. Given the travelling time between Auckland and Hamilton, the Commission concluded that consumer patrons would be unlikely to regard the two as substitutable.

As the two casinos would be in different geographic markets, the proposal did not raise dominance concerns.

Media contact: John Preston, Chief Investigator, Commerce Act Division

Phone work (04) 471 0180

Commission media releases can be viewed on its web site www.comcom.govt.nz