Inside Asian Gaming

January 2015 inside asian gaming 43 Marina Bay Sands and Sands Cotai Central through to completion and securing solid, stable management in Macau. He will continue as a director of the company. Mr Goldstein steps up at a time when political and economic winds are blowing ill out of China again, the Macau market is in turmoil, a new multibillion-dollar Sands resort is set to debut next year on Cotai, Singapore is struggling to recapture its momentum, and money flows are under intense government and law enforcement scrutiny industry-wide. Mr Goldstein’s track record is strongly in his favor, though, and his long association with Mr Adelson should provide a critical level of comfort and assure him of support from the top. “Our company is in the enviable position of having the most diverse set of assets and the strongest balance sheet in our industry, as well as being best-positioned to capitalize on future growth opportunities as they happen,” Mr Adelson said in announcing Mr Goldstein’s appointment. “With Rob’s strong leadership, passion and energy, I’m fully confident we will expand our industry leadership to deliver even greater achievements in the years ahead.” Weidner & Co. Best Bloomberry in Share Dispute The company that opened Manila’s Solaire Resort & Casino then was fired amid the property’s early struggles has been freed to sell its sizable stake in Solaire’s corporate owner. An arbitration panel in Singapore has lifted a freeze a Philippine court leveled earlier this year onGlobal GamingAssetManagement’s holding in Bloomberry Resorts (PSE: BLOOM), which represented a little less than 9% of the company’s equity when GGAM exercised an option on the stock shortly before Solaire’s US$750 million debut in March 2013. Solaire opened to acclaim as the first of four super-resorts licensed at Entertainment City, a 120-hectare reclamation area on Manila Bay sponsored by the Philippine government to leverage casinos to attract foreign tourism and investment. GGAM, founded by William Weidner, a former president of Las Vegas Sands, was contracted to develop and run the resort, but Bloomberry terminated the relationship when Solaire stumbled out of the gate. Bloomberry accused GGAM of breach of contract, alleging the company did not direct sufficient attention to managing the property. GGAM has disputed the charge before the arbitration panel. It’s likely the shares will continued to be tied up in litigation, however. In seeking the injunction, Bloomberry argued they were subject to counterclaims by some of its subsidiaries. The arbitrators didn’t address that issue, but in allowing GGAM “to freely deal with, including sell, the shares,” they denied GGAM’s request “to be declared full legal and beneficial owner of the shares free of any claims, liens or encumbrances”. Chinese Tourism Spells Good News for South Korea Chinese visitation to South Korea has grown to the point where the country is now the third-most popular destination for mainland tourists after Macau and Hong Kong. Visitation from China surged 51.5% from 2012 to 2013 and is forecast to grow another 40.9% in 2014 to more than 6 million, according to a report in English-language daily The Korea Herald . Including visitors from Hong Kong and Taiwan, the number of Chinese-speaking tourists is expected to surpass 7.4 million, accounting for more than half of all foreign arrivals. This is good news for a massive wave of planned investment in new gaming resorts targeting South Korea’s burgeoning high-roller market. Encouraged by more liberal policies on the part of a central government eager to cash in on the country’s popularity, two destination-scale casinos are in development in a special economic zone near Incheon International Airport, the main gateway for foreign arrivals, located about 30 kilometers from the capital of Seoul. The first, a joint venture between Paradise Group, the leader of the country’s foreigners-only casino market, and Japanese pachinko giant Sega Sammy is slated to open in 2017 at an initial cost of US$750 million. The second, a joint venture similarly priced and led by US casino operator Caesars Entertainment, recently struck a $95 million deal to acquire land for a resort scheduled to break ground in the zone this year ahead of a planned opening in 2018. A trio of smaller casinos backed by affiliates of Malaysian resort conglomerate Genting are planned or in development on the tourist island of Jeju—which is visa-free for Chinese travelers and is home to eight of the country’s 16 foreigners-only casinos—and in the northeastern province hosting the 2018 Winter Olympics. “The (close) proximity is one of the great advantages that draws Chinese tourists to Korea,” an official with the state-run Korea Tourism Organization told the Herald . “We saw more people coming from inland provinces as we focus our travel promotions on inland Chinese cities. The influence of the Korean [cultural] Wave has definitely been a strong attraction for Chinese tourists.” The Herald said tourism income is expected to grow more than 21% year on year in 2015, reaching $17.6 billion, with the Chinese comprising the biggest spenders, according to the KTO. REGIONAL BRIEFS William Weidner