Macau SAR Chief Executive Ho Iat Seng stated Monday there would be no more sub-concessions under revised gaming regulations, with the government expecting to launch a public consultation on the subject of license re-tendering within this year.
At a press conference following his maiden policy address to the Legislative Assembly, the Chief Executive emphasized that the amendment of gaming regulations will be the foundation of re-tendering with provisions allowing for the addition of sub-concessions among those to be cancelled.
“We’ll decide the exact number of gaming concessions. The situation of adding three more concessions to become six concessions, or adding six concessions to become 12, will no longer happen in the future. Otherwise it will equate to the full liberalization of gaming,” Ho said. “It’s not our direction.”
Regarding the number of gaming concessions to be issued as part of the coming re-tendering process, Ho refrained from offering any estimates but invited the public to provide more opinions to the government.
“We’ll start the public consultation on the amendment of gaming regulations within this year, hopefully it will not be impacted by the epidemic,” he said.
“The previous mid-term review had mentioned about gaming operators’ CSR, as well as what kind of responsibilities and non-gaming elements there should be. I hope the public can give more opinions and we’ll write them into the draft of the amendment of the law, and have discussions in the Legislative Assembly.”
Ho reiterated that there are no plans to cut gaming taxes, stating instead his belief that gaming operators will be able to survive for the duration of the pandemic.
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