Monopoly on tables until 2035
Hong Kong-listed NagaCorp is looking to Chinese tourists to increase gaming revenue at its NagaWorld casino in Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia. According to the South China Morning Post, the country hopes to draw 2 million Chinese visitors by 2020.
Presently, Chinese customers account for more than 20 percent of customers at NagaWorld, which has a monopoly on gaming tables in the market until 2035. “We used to have mostly Vietnamese guests,” Sean Tan, vice president of NagaCorp told the Post. “But now the bulk of our customers are—you guessed it—Mainland Chinese.”
The emphasis on Chinese guests should be a positive as Vietnam opens the doors to local players starting in December. Until now, Vietnam has barred its own countrymen from entering domestic gaming halls; when the government begins a three-year trial of locals gaming, analysts expect Cambodian casinos clustered along the border—many of which primarily serve Vietnamese—to feel the impact.
NagaCorp offers charter flights between Mainland China and Phnom Penh, and said the number of direct flights rose from 386 in 2013 to 580 in September.
The country reaped US$48 million in taxes from its casino industry last year, the Khmer Times reported—up 40 percent from 2015.
The Naga2 expansion will add 300 new gaming tables to NagaWorld, as well as 2,500 slot machines and 903 rooms in an atmosphere designed to make the Chinese feel at home. Cultural totems include a gold Buddha and a money tree.
“China is still a very new market to us,” said Tan. “We only penetrated it two or three years ago.” NagaCorp founder and CEO Chen Lip Keong says the company plans more casinos in countries around China, including Russia, Mongolia, Kazakhstan and Nepal.
“My vision is of Naga as a dragon,” said Tan. “It curves around China, the northeastern part of Russia and the north of Mongolia.” The company is currently planning a casino resort near the Russian Far East city of Vladivostok, about 112 miles from northeast China.
The Cambodia-based firm also recently sent a delegation to Australia’s Sunshine Coast, suspected to be scouting for IR development opportunities in the Maroochydore City Centre, Aussie media reported. The delegates includes NagaCorp owner Chen Lip Keong and Chairman Timothy McNally, along with Gary Andrews, business development director of China Railway Engineering Corp. and architect Paul Steelman, founder of Steelman Partners.
