Inside Asian Gaming

IAG JAN 2022年1月 亞博匯 95 焦點關注 THE TAKE-AWAY MESSAGE But here’s the good news. The key take-away sentence in the government response is this, “Measures to restrict dividends are not designed to prevent reasonable profit distributions from normal business practices, but to ensure that the concessionaires have sufficient financial resources to fulfill their obligations stipulated in the law and under the concession contract.” This is the answer everybody has been waiting on – if it is to be believed. It clarifies that the policy intention is “not designed to prevent reasonable profit distributions from normal business practices.” They just want the concessionaires to be solvent, to have the cash on hand to do what the government wants them to do. So, if you believe this, and you believe that Macau gaming concessionaires have historically had “sufficient financial resources to fulfill their obligations stipulated in the law and under the concession contract,” then you must believe that the proposal to require government authorization for dividends will not amount to any practical change for theMacau operators. This is the first time the government has expressed this clarification and should go a long way to calming the market – if the market is astute enough to read between the lines and receive the message. Our next step on the road to clarity is to wait until the draft amendment is made public, so that we can see the precise language drafted to give effect to the policy intention. And if our suspicions are correct, we might be seeing that as early as this month. 一個要點 但是也是有好消息的。政府在回應 中有一句關鍵句是這麼說的：「限制利 潤分成的措施並非阻止合理分配利潤的 正常商業行為，而是確保承批公司具有 足夠的財力履行法律及批給合同訂定的 義務。」 這就是大家都在等的答案——如果 可信的話。這澄清了該政策的意圖「並 非阻止合理分配利潤的正常商業行為」 ，他們只是希望承批公司有償付能力， 手頭有足夠的現金去做政府希望他們做 的事情。因此，如果您相信這一點，並 認為澳門的博企歷來有「足夠的財力履 行法律及批給合同訂定的義務」，那麼 你就要認同這個派息須經政府授權的提 案，對澳門博企運營商而言，並不構成 任何實際變化。 這是政府第一次做出這種澄清，如 果市場足夠敏銳，能夠從字裏行間讀懂 並接收到信息，那麼其應該對安撫市場 大有幫助。 在靜待塵埃落定的下一步是等到修 正案草案的公佈，這樣我們就可以看到 為落實政策意圖而起草的準確措辭。並 且如果我們的設想是正確的，應該最早 在本月就能看到這一點。