Inside Asian Gaming

inside asian gaming August 2015 42 Landing to Buy Out Genting Hong Kong’s Stake in Jeju Casino Hong Kong’s Landing International has agreed to buy out the half stake in a casino on South Korea’s resort island of Jeju held by its partner Genting Hong Kong for 130 trillion won (US$112 million), as it bets on the opportunities brought about by the influx of Chinese tourists to the island. The Jeju Hotel & Resort is a 50-50 joint venture between Genting Hong Kong and Landing, which has a wide array of businesses ranging from semiconductor lighting products to property development. The transaction, announced by Landing, will bring the company a step closer to a presence in the gaming industry. “[The Jeju casino] will provide a good platform for the group to build up its own brand name and goodwill in the gaming industry, and to develop its own professional team in casino operation and management,” Landing said in a statement to the Hong Kong stock exchange. Jeju is one of South Korea’s visa-free entry points for mainland Chinese tourists, whose visits to the country surged 58% to 2.9 million last year. The casino has seen revenue surge 16-fold and turned a net profit of HK$50 million (US$6.5 million) over the first- half of this year. The disposal by Genting Hong Kong, an affiliate of Malaysian resorts conglomerate Genting Group, will allow it to focus on the cruise business, the statement says. Genting in March bought luxury cruise line Crystal Cruises from Japan’s Nippon Yusen Kabushiki Kaisha for US$550 million. “Our intention is to make Crystal Cruises the core of what will become the world’s premier luxury hospitality and lifestyle brand portfolio for years to come,” said Genting Chairman Tan Sri Lim Kok Thay. Meanwhile, Genting Hong Kaid said it had also signed a letter of intent with Lloyd Werft in Germany to build three new “Crystal Exclusive Class” cruise ships with the first of these polar ice class vessels expected for delivery in late 2018. Cambodia Gaming Tax Revenue Up 20% in H1 Gaming tax revenue reached US$12 million in the first six months of the year, a 20% increase over the first half of 2014, due to a greater number of Thai nationals crossing into Cambodia to gamble. Ros Phearun, a spokesman for the Finance Ministry, said casinos in Cambodia paid the state $12 million in taxes between 1st January and the end of June, compared to $10 million during the same period last year, while the number of licensed casinos rose from 57 to 65. “The amount of casino tax revenue collected is dependent on the situation in the border areas. The proportion [of tax revenues] from the Cambodia-Thailand border areas is large,” Mr Phearun said. “Previously, there were problems along the Cambodia-Thailand border, so nobody came to gamble at the casinos, but currently, the situation is better,” he added, referring to the military takeover of Thailand in May last year. Mr Phearun said, however, that fewer people had been traveling from Vietnam to Cambodia to gamble, particularly Chinese investors who left Vietnam due to escalating tension over the South China Sea dispute. “Those investors left the country, and so fewer and fewer guests came to Cambodia,” he said. Vietnam’s recent efforts to build more casinos inside its own borders, and install slot machines in five-star hotels, also resulted in fewer border-crossing gamblers. Okada Gets Extension on Manila Casino Deadline Japanese tycoon Kazuo Okada increased budgeting for the first phase of a Philippine casino by a third to $2 billion, in return for obtaining a government extension on the delayed project in the capital city. The total investment may reach about $4 billion, said Kenji Sugiyama, president at Okada’s Tiger Resort, Leisure and Entertainment Inc. The initial phase, scheduled to open in December 2016, will have two hotels with 1,000 rooms, 500 gaming tables, and feature a nightclub and man-made beach housed in a giant glass dome, he said. The Okada project is among four integrated casino resorts the government wants built in the 120-hectare (297-acre) Entertainment City complex along Manila Bay to compete with Asian neighbors Singapore and Macau for gaming revenues. Each holder of the four licenses was required to spend at least $1 billion to build luxury hotels, shops, entertainment areas and gambling floors. Tiger Resort had sought to postpone the opening of its casino to December 2016, after it missed an earlier March 2015 deadline as Mr Okada encountered delays finding a local partner, which was needed to meet a cap on foreign land ownership. Philippine Amusement & Gaming Corp., the national casino REGIONAL BRIEFS The Jeju Hotel & Resort Rendering of Tiger Resort’s planned Manila Bay Resorts