Pretty darn toxic — at least in Singapore, where they don’t hold any truck with the wink-wink, nudge-nudge farce that passes for "regulation" in Nevada these days. As you’ve read, Genting subsidiary Star Cruises sold a minority interest to Stanley Ho. Star is also a participant in Genting’s planned Sentosa Island integrated resort, which will include a casino (the carrot that Singapore dangled in front of bidders).
Not surprisingly, news of a Genting/Ho alliance kicked over a hornet’s nest in Singapore. The former’s argument, that Ho wouldn’t be receiving any Sentosa dollars, sounded like mere sophistry. Also, it had the appearance of being a quid pro quo for a Genting-built Macao hotel that would host a casino owned by … who else but Stanley Ho? So, in other words, old Stan was allowing Genting to play in his Macanese backyard in return for getting, at the very least, an indirect piece of the Sentosa action.
This didn’t sit well with Singapore authorities, who threatened that they might let Genting go ahead with the resort … minus the casino, which would be a bitter pill for Genting to swallow. This dealt a staggering blow to Genting’s stock price, even if the government’s ploy may have been a bluff.
Now Genting is signaling that it might be willing to sacrifice its Macao deal in order to get that Sentosa casino. Quite a contrast to here, where a mammoth casino company is arguing with a straight face that its economic survival hinges on playing footsie with a mobbed-up casino tycoon. The next time someone hails the integrity and probity of Nevada’s gaming-regulatory system, please try not to laugh. Too loudly, that is.
Mao tse-Adelson? The Venetian supremo is taking a page from those press-friendly despots in Peking, whose #1 cheerleader he has become. BlogMacau.info ("News in Brief," last item) reports that Hong Kong media were personae non grata at Wednesday’s Cotai groundbreaking. But then, as we know from his elephantine effort to muzzle the Las Vegas Sun’s Jeff Simpson, El Bombastico is no great fan of the First Amendment.
Casino Jack strikes back: Jailbird Jack Abramoff will continue to warble for the feds, it appears, no doubt leading to many sleepless nights for his fellow Beltway malefactors. Couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of guys, including former Sen. Conrad Burns.
