Word: macau
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...credit crisis have turned some bottom lines red, while major new projects have been shelved due to lack of financing and an uncertain business outlook. The latest hard-luck story: MGM Mirage. This week, the Las Vegas-based company disclosed that New Jersey gaming industry regulators object to its Macau joint venture partner, raising the possibility that MGM Mirage could pull out of the market. (Watch a video about Macau's gambling boom...
...Mirage opened the $1.25 billion MGM Grand Macau hotel and casino in 2007 in partnership with Pansy Ho, daughter of tycoon Stanley Ho, who held a monopoly on gaming in Macau for four decades and continues to operate casinos in the city today. In a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, MGM Mirage said that the New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement had deemed Pansy Ho an "unsuitable" partner after a four-year investigation. The agency recommended that MGM Mirage "be directed to disengage" itself from the joint venture. Company officials didn't reveal the reasons why regulators...
...results of the investigation have thrown the future of MGM Mirage's Macau business into confusion. Although the report is only a recommendation, New Jersey's Casino Control Commission could order the company to end the partnership if its findings are upheld. New Jersey gaming authorities have jurisdiction over MGM Mirage's business associations because the company owns part of a casino in Atlantic City. (Read about greyhound racing in Macau...
...While MGM Mirage has been hit by a regulatory bombshell, other Macau casino operators are suffering financial fallout in a market turned cold by recession and an unexpected shift in Chinese policy. Last year, Chinese authorities without explanation began restricting the number of citizens who were allowed to enter Macau. Gaming revenues fell to $3.3 billion in the first quarter of 2009, a decline of almost 13% compared with the same period a year earlier; the number of visitors to the city dropped by nearly 10% in the first quarter. The declines are hitting hoteliers and casinos hard. Melco Crown...
...Hardest hit has been Las Vegas Sands, whose chairman, Sheldon Adelson, envisioned transforming a stretch of reclaimed Macau land called Cotai into a new Las Vegas Strip with a $12-billion development of hotels and casinos. He launched the effort in 2007 with the opening of a 3,000-room Venetian hotel similar to his flagship Las Vegas property. But last year Adelson struggled to find financing for the project. Construction on new hotels was suspended in November, and the company recently said it would cut as many as 4,000 workers from its Macau operations. Late last year...