The 13 Holdings Ltd (十三集團) missed yesterday’s deadline to open its luxury hotel in Macau, a condition of a HK$3 billion (US$384 million) loan from Bank of Communications Co (交通銀行) for the gaming project just off the Cotai strip, people familiar with the matter said.
The US$1.6 billion development, started by The 13 Holdings cochairman Stephen Hung (洪永時), formerly cohead of Asia investment banking at Merrill Lynch, now aims to open before the end of the year, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the discussions are confidential.
Set to feature 200 villas with furniture evocative of the French Baroque period, marble Roman baths and 24-hour butler service, the project was planned before China’s crackdown on corruption scared VIPs away and sent casino revenue into a slump for almost three years.
Photo: Bloomberg
A spokeswoman for The 13 Holdings said the company has obtained the occupation permit from Macau’s government, is currently in the process of obtaining necessary licenses for the pre-opening and operational phase, and is in the final stages of completion of the property known as The 13 Hotel.
The entrance to the hotel over the weekend was blocked by construction materials.
Shares dropped as much as 2.9 percent in yesterday’s afternoon trading in Hong Kong. The company has lost more than half of its market value this year.
A spokesman for Bank of Communications in Hong Kong declined to comment on the loan or its terms, while another in Shanghai did not immediately comment.
The 13 Holdings has raised US$1.2 billion for the project, according to exchange filings. Total budget for the development is US$1.6 billion, meaning US$400 million is needed to finish construction of the hotel, and pay financing fees as well as costs associated with a casino, according to people with knowledge of the matter.
“I think there is a certain amount of skepticism in the capital markets regarding a project of this scope,” said Andrew Klebanow, Las Vegas-based senior partner of Global Market Advisors LLC. “The downturn in the very high-end market certainly illustrated that this market segment is vulnerable to changes in central government policy as well as traditional economic forces.”
Separately, Chinese billionaire Guo Guangchang (郭廣昌), whose Fosun International Ltd (復星國際) is under scrutiny by Chinese authorities over its foreign mergers and acquisitions, said the government’s clampdown on outbound investments is necessary to protect the economy.
“The recent scrutiny on overseas investments and financial irregularities are necessary, timely and can eradicate a lot of irrational investments,” Guo said in a letter posted on Fosun’s official WeChat social-media account on Saturday. “If we don’t take some measures, foreigners will take us as ‘dumb people with a lot of money.’”
Fosun has been among a group of prolific acquirers — including HNA Group Co (海航集團), Dalian Wanda Group Co (萬達集團) and Anbang Insurance Group Co (安邦保險集團) — that have slowed their pace of acquisitions as China stepped up its scrutiny of capital outflows and mounting debt.
“I believe the government’s attitude toward truthful, compliant overseas investments has never changed, and we have indeed felt government support for our projects,” Guo said in his letter, which he wrote while on flight from Paris to Shanghai.
The tycoon also pledged to back Beijing’s Belt and Road initiative, citing Fosun’s investments in banking and insurance assets in Europe as a way the company is supporting the campaign.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained