Inside Asian Gaming

INSIDE ASIAN GAMING DECEMBER 2017 54 ASIAN GAMING POWER 50 2 0 1 7 With three CEOs this year, Imperial Pacific International (IPI) is decidedly under the control of Ji Xiaobo, the former Heng Sheng junket executive listed as its US$1 million a year project manager in Saipan, center of the Commonwealth of Northern Marianas Islands, a US Pacific territory with visa-free entry for mainland Chinese. Mainland born Mr Ji and his mother hold most of Hong Kong listed IPI’s equity. Imperial Pacific’s casino soft opened in July. It has 30 VIP and 46 mass tables, 184 machines, a restaurant and lounge, with 340 oceanfront guest rooms to come. Mark Brown, who rose from dealer to President of Trump Casinos before opening Venetian Macao, got IPI on track, securing the hotel site, opening a temporary “training” casino and producing astronomic VIP roll – US$6 billion on 16 tables reported last December – but he couldn’t finish financing the hotel. He moved from Saipan CEO to Chairman in January. His successor, old school Macau executive Kwong Yiu-ling, ceded after the soft opening to Henry Cheang. Roll reports have since stopped and IPI’s situation remains murky. It reported first half revenue of HK$7.3 billion (US$938 million) – 97% from VIP gaming – and HK$8.1 billion in outstanding customer debt. Henry Cheng CHAIRMAN Chow Tai Fook Enterprises DIRECTOR SJM Holdings POWER 885 LAST 37 SCORE YEAR CLAIMS TO FAME Acquired Baha Mar casino resort in Bahamas from China state creditors Stakes in Vietnam and Australia IRs plus Macau’s SJM Holdings 30 The Cheng family has made good money from being good friends. In the 1980s, Stanley Ho asked patriarch Cheng Yu-tung to buy 10% of STDM, his Macau gaming and tourism vehicle, from an unwanted investor. Last year, when the Caribbean’s largest ever hospitality project, US$3.5 billion Baha Mar, was mired in bankruptcy amid allegations of substandard work by a China State Construction Engineering subsidiary, administrator and top creditor Import-Export Bank of China turned to the Cheng’s privately held Chow Tai Fook Enterprises (affiliated with but separate from the eponymous jewelry retailer). Baha Mar extends a winning streak in gaming for Henry Cheng, family leader following his father’s passing in September last year. In 2015, CTFE acquired majority ownership of Vietnam’s US$4 billion Hoi An South Integrated Resort project, once a Genting investment and now dubbed Hoiana, with Suncity and local investor VinaCapital. Later that year, in Australia, it was part of Destination Brisbane’s winning bid, led by Star (then Echo) Entertainment, for an AU$3 billion (US$2.3 billion) riverfront IR in Queensland’s capital. Still ramping up, Baha Mar gives the Chengs a chance to run their own casino resort. The family has already found synergy, placing a Rosewood Hotel from its New World Hospitality portfolio in each IR.