Inside Asian Gaming

inside asian gaming August 2014 14 Genting’s investments in resort casinos in Las Vegas, New York and Florida could surpass $10 billion over the next several years. That’s if everything unfolds as planned. But even if it doesn’t, there’s enough to pose an enticing prospect for investors—possibly in an IPO. Cover Story Looking for America W hen the Nevada Gaming Commission gave Genting its blessing to develop its US$4 billion Resorts World Las Vegas, an Asian company became for the first time the largest prospective developer of casinos in the United States. The firsts just flow from there. When it opens the doors three years from now it will be the first all-new Las Vegas Strip megaresort in nearly a decade. It will be the first to feature a rooftop sky park and observation deck and water rides and possibly the first casino in the world to house a live panda habitat. Importantly, it will be the first casino conceived from the ground up with the Strip’s increasingly influential Chinese market in mind and the first that will be themed top to bottom with the specific aim of delighting that market. “It will be a game-changer,” Gaming Commission Chairman Peter Bernhard said back in May when the state’s top regulatory body found Genting suitable to hold a gaming license. It’s been tough for the Strip to get back to the salad days it enjoyed before the recession. Since 2007—a peak year for revenues, the one just before the housing market collapsed and domestic consumption with it— passenger traffic through McCarran International Airport is ‘Game-changer’—the $4 billion Resorts World Las Vegas.