Genting Casino in danger... soon?

No, it is not that PAS will take away the license for Genting Resort to operate its casino in Malaysia, but neighbourhood competition from Thailand and Singapore might emerged if both the neighbouring countries "OK-signed" to the proposal of building their own casino around next year.

Based on the figures reported, Singapore accounted for more than 20% of Resorts' hotels guests, while Thai visitors formed less than 7% of the total.

From these data, Singapore rival seems to have more impact on Genting than the Thai rival if both countries approved on allowing the deployment of casino on their own land. However it is, the impact has already took effect somewhere in February this year, when the share price for Resort World fell by over 20% while the talk of such an event reach to its peak. A sign of investors' fear.

For some brief information, Singapore casino would be build on its resort island of Sentosa, while Thailand would likely to locate its casino in the tourist area of Pattaya.

Genting, as well as other international casino-based business players, hinted on their interest in investing on these casinos, if it is approved in the near future. Estimates have put the value of Asia's legal gambling industry at about $14 billion. Therefore, this industry surely is a lucrative investment in the point of view as a business and as long as profits is concerned.

However, Malaysian still account for some 56% of guests at the resort's hotels while the total of Malaysian visitors accounted for some 86% of the total visitors for a year. Therefore, Genting is still considered to be at a safe point as long as the local "support" stays at that level of percentage.

At least one of my friends will still go to Genting casino whenever she finds it "fit". That's what she said...