Another auction involving gaming equipment owned by Imperial Pacific International (IPI), which operates the shuttered Imperial Palace Saipan casino in the Northern Mariana Islands, is scheduled to take place December 9.
This sale will focus primarily on larger equipment, such as table games, 50 like-new Aristocrat slot machines pre-loaded with games and furniture such as stools and chairs.
The first auction, which took place back in October, featured smaller equipment such as chip sorters and card shufflers. That sale, which attracted buyers from Asia, Europe and Latin America, fetched a little over $400,000.
Clear Management Ltd, a debt collection firm, is facilitating the auction. Co-founder Tim Shepherd told Inside Asian Gaming that his company has “already received bids for Auction 2 and since we added slot machines and a bigger variety of equipment, many more interested parties contacting us from across the world.”
According to Shepherd, he plans to hold at least two more asset sales in 2023, after a court order instructed the company to fetch what they could in order to help pay off some of IPI’s debts, which currently sit at about $24 million.
IPI is currently entrenched in legal proceedings with local regulators to reinstate its suspended casino license. The company has repeatedly tried to block the auctions, saying that it plans to reopen Imperial Palace soon. Equipment sales, IPI argues, will only hamper that progress.
New equipment could be found relatively quickly and easily, Shepherd told IAG, but he and others feel that the casino itself “requires a fair amount of work to be ready to accept customers.”
With regards to the upcoming sale, however, Shepherd was optimistic about potential returns, noting that “ IPI only bought world class equipment and even though it’s been in storage, the casino management team maintained it professionally before the casino closed.”
