Currently a
firm with casino operations in Macau and the Philippines, Melco Resorts is
strongly interested on the new Japanese casino market.
Davis’
boss, Melco Resorts’ Chairman and CEO Lawrence Ho Yau Lung, had said at the
CLSA Japan Forum 2017 in February – an investor conference in the Japanese
capital Tokyo – that his firm would "absolutely spend whatever we need to win”
a Japan casino licence.
The CFO’s
own comments came during a presentation on the first day of the Japan Gaming
Congress in Tokyo on Wednesday, a conference organised by Clarion Events.
It was
revealed this week that Melco Resorts would no longer be bound by an earlier
agreement to work with Australia’s Crown Resorts Ltd in a Japan licence bid. It
followed news that Crown Resorts was disposing of its remaining stake in Melco
Resorts.
Davis CFO
noted during JgC: "What we are thinking is all about innovative, unique, really
groundbreaking design. We are not about cookie cutter development. We are not
going to pick up a property [design] in one market and put it in another. We’ll
be inspired to do something unique and spectacular.”
The finance
boss also mentioned what he said was the company’s good track record in
tackling and preventing problem gambling. The subject is much discussed among
Japanese lawmakers, even those in favour of the casino legalisation policy.
