Las Vegas Sands quietly became the fifth international IR operator to throw its weight behind Osaka’s bid to become the host of the 2025 World Expo at the city’s Yumeshima location.
Sands made this move in March, but it did so without drawing any press attention to its campaign.
Contacted by Asia Gaming Brief, George Tanasijevich, Sands’ managing director of global development, explained, “Osaka is a special business city where its long history and rich culture exist alongside technologically-sophisticated companies and warm, dynamic local people. The 2025 World Expo is an opportunity for Osaka to highlight these qualities and enhance its importance as a global city and destination. Las Vegas Sands is proud to be an Official Partner of Osaka’s 2025 World Expo bid. We wish Osaka the best as it gears up for the final stages of the bid, and look forward to contributing to the city’s successful holding of the 2015 World Expo if it wins the bid.”
Last October, Melco Resorts & Entertainment became the first operator to back Osaka’s World Expo bid, and was followed by MGM, Hard Rock, and Caesars.
This Dossier results from the “Life After POGOs” editorial project by Asia Gaming Brief which culminated with a pop-up digital forum on 9th December to discuss potentials ramifications in the industry.
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On 3 April 2020, the Ministry of Home Affairs of Singapore (MHA) announced that it will be reconstituting the Casino Regulatory Authority (CRA) to establish the Gambling Regulatory Authority (GRA) by 2021. The GRA will have an expanded mandate to regulate the entire gambling landscape in Singapore and aims to consolidate and optimize gambling regulatory resources within a single agency.
The Macau Civil Servants Association has urged Chief Executive Ho Iat Sent to encourage the other five gaming operators to follow SJM Holdings in providing a "reward" to employees early in the New Year.
Over the years, many of the answers have been remarkably prescient in their forecasts for the near-term direction of Asia’s gaming industry. However, we can safely say that no one came anywhere close to guessing
what 2020 may have had in store.
While nowhere in the world has escaped the economic fallout from the Covid-19 crisis, Macau has been hit harder than most, with forecasts for gross domestic product to shrink more than 50 percent this year.
Before the Covid-19 crisis, tourism in the Greater Mekong Sub-Region was at a record high, on track to welcome 80 million visitors in 2019, generating some $90 billion in revenue.