Inside Asian Gaming

inside asian gaming August 2014 22 Cover Story Genting Americas is the obvious choice for the public company. This is the wholly owned GENM subsidiary in charge of the megaresort proposed for Miami, which includes some $400 million worth of prime real estate on the city’s Biscayne Bay, and bids on two resorts in Orange County, NY., targeting the massive New York City market. There are a couple of other prospective assets that could be folded in to make Genting Americas even more interesting. These are tied more or less to Kien Huat Realty, the private company that holds the Lim family’s controlling interest in Genting Berhad. Kien Huat’s $160 million investment in getting Foxwoods Resort Casino off the ground back in the early ’90s is the stuff of industry legend. Wall Street and the banks wouldn’t touch Indian gaming in those days, and it would take Foxwoods to change that. It would grow to become the largest casino in the world, it’s still the largest in the US, and it was the most lucrative before the recession and regional competition and expansion-related debt took their toll. It’s reported that Kien Huat still collects 10% of gaming revenue, and to get an idea of what that’s been worth, at its peak in 2005, Foxwoods generated more than $819 million just from slots. Kien Huat also owns 61.5% of the stock of Nasdaq-listed Empire Resorts, which owns Monticello Casino & Raceway, a harness track with 1,100 VLTs and e-tables in the Catskill Mountains about 100miles northwest of New York City. Monticello made $15.5 million in the quarter ended 31st March. Kien Huat plans to invest in Empire’s joint- venture bid in the Catskills for one of the four new casino licenses the state is expected to award sometime before the end of this year. The casino portion would be part of a $1 billion mixed-use development to which Empire wants to commit more than $600 million if it can raise the money. If the JV were to win a license, and Genting wins one of its bids farther south in Orange County, this could all be folded into a publicly traded Genting Americas, presenting investors with a company positioned to dominate the greater New York City market with $2 billion worth of new resort casinos in addition to the 5,000 VLTs at Aqueduct. The company also could be in a position to share in the profits of a Boston-area casino, also through entities controlled by Mr Lim, who shares his father’s taste for opportunities in US tribal gaming. The Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe won federal recognition in 2007 and has applied to the government to take land into trust on its behalf for a $500 million casino with 3,000 slots, 150 table games, 300 hotel rooms and other amenities in the city of Taunton about 35 miles south of Boston. Mr Lim is backing the bid with loans to the tribe that have totaled a reported $90 million to date. GAMBLING ON A RECOVERY The guy in charge at Genting Americas is Christian Goode, the 38-year-old CFO and senior vice president of development. He is also CFO of Genting New York. A lawyer with a background in commercial gaming, he served for a time as controller at Seneca Niagara Resort & Casino, whose construction was financed by Kien Huat. Later, he was director of compliance for Seneca Gaming Corp., which has grown to become a corporate power in western New York with assets that include two other casinos, two hotels and a golf course. A New York native, Mr Goode is reported to have moved to the West Coast to be closer to the action in Las Vegas. The plan for the Strip calls for 3,000 hotel rooms and 22 “villas” in the first phase, housed in a 675-foot tower sheathed in red as befitting its Chinese theme. There will be shops, dozens of food and beverage outlets, a convention center and attractions that include the sky park and a 50,000-square-foot aquarium. The casino will Trends bode well for the Strip, which appears to be recovering faster than the US economy as a whole.