Casinos in South Korea have been left out of a 100 billion won (US$80 million) aid package designed to help the tourism industry, even though the majority of them contribute 10 percent of revenues to the government each year.
According to the Korea Herald, the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism allocated the funds for special loans from its Tourism Promotion Fund, but the country’s 17 casinos cannot apply for them, even though they will kick in 269.6 billion won, or 20.5 percent of the total fund.
Casinos “are struggling to pay their bills,” due to the Covid-19 outbreak, the Herald reported.
“How are we supposed to pay when there are no customers?” asked an official from the Korea Casino Association (KCA).
“After decades of contributions, we have been excluded from the special loans at this time of crisis. There is no support from the government at all. We are planning to file a request for delaying the payment.”
According to the KCA, 16 foreign-only casinos saw a 62.1 percent drop in visitation in the second week of March, from almost 60,000 to fewer than 23,000. Sales were down 79.5 percent from 36.6 billion won to 7.5 billion won in the same period.
Seven Luck Casino, operated by Grand Korea Leisure, has closed three locations in Seoul and Busan until April 6 at the earliest.
“Since the end of January, Seven Luck Casino banned the entry of Chinese tour groups,” said an official. “But things are getting more difficult as the government restricted entries of Japanese tourists. There are fewer customers, so losses are inevitable compared to last year.”
The Korean government has restricted visa-free entries for Japanese nationals from March 9 to the end of this month in retaliation against Japan’s two-week quarantine of all visitors from South Korea.
Meanwhile, Kangwon Land, the only casino in South Korea that permits Korean nationals to gamble, extended its temporary closure — which took effect on Feb. 23 — yet again for a fourth time until March 23.
“Every Friday, a decision is made whether to extend the temporary closure or not. However, nothing has been decided for now,” said an official of Kangwon Land.
Last year, Kangwon Land recorded sales of 1.52 trillion won with net income of 336.1 billion won. That would mean the casino is losing 910 million won in income every day.
In response, the Culture Ministry said the special loans were aimed for small businesses.
“The special loans are for small travel agencies and accommodation businesses that cannot provide collateral for loans,” said an official from the ministry.
