Crown Casino

What an offshore gambling mecca reveals about business in China Dec, 2011, Economist - "Gaming revenues in the first 11 months of the year were 44% higher than in 2010... [The casinos] are trying to attract more 'mass-market' customers, who actually want to gamble for fun... A high-speed railway being built from Guangzhou province to Macau will make it easier to lure them. Some casinos are also building venues with less floor space for blackjack and more for shops, theatres and restaurants..."

Macau: where China likes to spend it, March, 2011, Guardian - "Las Vegas is puny in comparison. Chinese punters bet around £70 billion on Macau's baize tables (they prefer baccarat) last month alone. This year it could reach £1 trillion, an almost unimaginably colossal sum. Think of all the cash issued from all the UK's ATMs last year. Then multiply it by five... Back on the smoke-filled "mass market" floors, the minimum bets are typically £20 - significantly higher than Vegas. But there are no free cocktails or slot machines. There aren't even smiling faces. Gambling here is a serious business... The authorities, for now at least, turn a blind eye. The casinos are a huge cash cow for the Chinese state, too, which levies tax at 39%. If Macau gets out of hand, Beijing can turn it into a desert overnight by refusing internal visas to mainland Chinese. But the casino operators think that unlikely - as the money might instead switch to Singapore, away from Chinese control, where two new mega-casinos are already close to matching the whole of Vegas in takings."

Crown Misses Estimates After Losing Business to Singapore, March, 2011, Bloomberg - "Crown Ltd., Australia''s biggest casino owner, reported earnings that missed analyst estimates after losing business in the high-stakes gambling segment to new rival venues in Singapore... The division that relies on high rollers reported an 8 percent drop in revenue as Genting Singapore Plc and Las Vegas Sands Corp. opened venues in Singapore. Crown, controlled by billionaire James Packer, is renovating both its Melbourne and Perth venues to attract locals and reverse the decline in the VIP business... Macau, the only place in China where casinos are legal, posted a 15 percent increase in arrivals to 25 million last year, with 83 percent coming from mainland China and Hong Kong"

Singapore's casino gamble pays off one year on, Feburary, 2011 - "Just one year after opening its first casino, Singapore has emerged as Asia's hottest new gambling capital with a revamped cityscape and billions of dollars pouring into the economy... PricewaterhouseCoopers predicted that Singapore would overtake South Korea and Australia this year to become the second-largest Asia-Pacific casino market behind traditional leader Macau. 'In 2011, with a full year's operation for both resorts, we expect revenues to reach $5.5 billion, growing to $8.3 billion by 2014,' it said... In the latest financial statement issued by parent company Las Vegas Sands, Marina Bay Sands was shown to have raked in $1.02 billion in revenues from its casino operations in 2010. Resorts World Sentosa declined to disclose specific casino revenue numbers, but its total revenue stood at $1.53 billion for the nine-month period ending September 30, 2010."