A standard human pregnancy lasts precisely 40 weeks. So, if you had conceived a baby on Tuesday 14 September 2021, the day the public consultation period for Macau’s new gaming law was announced, that baby should be due on Tuesday 21 June 2022, the day the Macau Legislative Assembly (AL) is expected to finally birth it into existence. This is despite the weekend outbreak of COVID-19. When asked by IAG yesterday (19 June) whether the outbreak would disrupt the passage of the new law, Macau’s Secretary for Economy and Finance Lei Wai Nong replied, “The schedule of the Legislative Council meeting for the Gaming Law has not changed.”
Let’s look back at those 40 weeks of twists and turns.
The whole process kicked off in earnest on Tuesday 15 September at 5pm – less than 48 hours after the elections for the 7th term of the Macau Legislative Assembly (AL) – when Macau’s Secretary for Economy and Finance, Lei Wai Nong, fronted a press conference announcing a 45-day public consultation period beginning the next day.
This led to a panicked sell-off of Macau gaming stocks the following day, wiping out US$18.4 billion from the market capitalization of the Hong Kong-listed entities of the six concessionaires, representing 26% of their value.
The public consultation period saw much debate and discussion about the new law. Despite being hampered by COVID-19 it still managed to finish on time due to a flurry of session rescheduling, and eventually saw its report issued on 23 December last year. In the Macau government style to which we’ve become accustomed, it was in the very late afternoon of the last business day before Christmas.
After the report was issued, we saw a draft law published by the Macau Legislative Assembly in very quick time, on 18 January this year.
The law was then handed to the Second Standing Committee of the AL for discussion and analysis, and by early March it become obvious there was no way the new law could be passed and a tender process finalized by the looming deadline of 26 June, and we eventually saw it extended to 31 December this year.
Much debate ensued over the law in the AL, with extensive analysis and opinion offered by the commentariat. Much – arguably too much – was made of the fate of Macau’s satellite casinos.
Last week, the Second Standing Committee issued its “opinion letter” outlining its thoughts and positions to the full Legislative Assembly (and anybody else who cares to read it), with Chairman Andrew Chan Chak Mo telling the media on Wednesday last week that the full AL will discuss and vote on the bill on Tuesday 21 June at the earliest.
The Macau government has been adamant that it wants or even “needs” to pass the new gaming law before the 26 June – even though the two things are not really correlated at all.
It seems a fait accompli that the bill as it stands will be very briefly discussed in the full AL during the week ahead and passed with mere days to spare before the concession contracts expire at midnight at the end of Sunday June 26. Given that the contract extensions to 31 December need to be formally announced – presumably after the law is passed but obviously before the Sunday night expiration, it seems like the coming Tuesday is a very good day to pass the law.
Let’s see if the baby gets born on the exact day the doctors predicted, precisely 40 weeks after conception!
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