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Singapore. Singapore is set to open its first casino as early as this weekend, in the city-state’s latest roll of the dice in its efforts to turn from a staid manufacturing hub to an Asian playground for the rich.

The opening of the Resorts World at Sentosa by Genting Singapore may be timed to coincide with the Lunar New Year holiday to attract thousands of overseas and mainland Chinese to the island, industry sources and analysts said.

Malaysia-based Genting declined to confirm the opening date, after the government granted Genting a license to operate the casino this past weekend, earlier than the expected March or April start and ahead of rival Las Vegas Sands Singapore.

“The early opening ahead of Marina Bay Sands will be positive as it allows RWS to reap the full benefits of a monopoly during the typically peak Chinese New Year festive season,” said Keith Wee of OSK Research in Kuala Lumpur.

Deutsche Bank in a report on Monday forecast it would make 1.7 billion Singapore dollars ($1.2 billion) of gross gaming revenue in its first year.

Singapore is gambling on casinos to increase its tourism revenues and lead to spin-offs such as luxury services and increased business for wealth managers.

Known for shopping malls, efficiency and staid social engineering, it is already home to the highest density of millionaires in the world, and the casinos will add to the glamor from a Formula One night street race.

The Straits Times newspaper reported on Monday that Genting had told staff and tenants that the casino and associated Universal Studios theme park at its Resorts World at Sentosa casino-resort will open this week.

In January, the company opened four of its six hotels as well as some shops and food outlets, while casino staff were trained by role playing as clients and croupiers.

A few visitors were allowed to try the rides at Universal Studios, alongside Genting staff, indicating the company was ready to open the park, said the marketing head of a mobile phone company who was part of a group touring the Resorts World last month.

“The smoking section had been ‘smoked in’ already to help the smokers feel right at home,” said a Singapore-based banker, who brought his Malaysian and Singaporean fund manager clients to visit the resort last week.

Singapore legalized casino gambling in 2005 and said it will allow two casino resorts to be built as part of ambitious plans to double visitor arrivals to 17 million by 2015.

Casino operators in Singapore will pay an effective tax of around 12 percent on net revenue from gamblers, giving them an incentive to draw Asian high rollers away from Macau where the tax is just under 40 percent.

Each integrated resort is expected to contribute a value add of 2.7 billion Singapore dollars to Singapore’s gross domestic product in 2015, Singapore’s tourism promotion agency estimates, roughly between 0.5 percent and 1 percent of GDP.



Reuters