Inside Asian Gaming

IAG JAPAN DEC 2019 8 Ben Blaschke Managing Editor We crave your feedback. Please email your comments to bb@asgam.com. www.asgam.com EDITORIAL Riding the wave T he Philippines is not only one of the world’s most exciting gaming markets right now, but also one of its most diverse. It’s a point that was driven home to me when I spent a week there last month and, thanks to our friends at RGB, was fortunate enough to be granted tours of a variety of properties in Clark, Subic Bay and Manila. Casino gaming is nothing new to the Philippines, with the nation’s gaming regulator, PAGCOR, having opened its first casino – the floating Manila Bay Casino – in 1977 (coincidentally the year of my birth!). Nowadays, between PAGCORS’s Casino Filipino- branded casinos, the luxury integrated resorts found in Entertainment City and the handful of slots clubs scattered throughout the city, there are more than 25 casinos located in Metro Manila alone. The most notable, of course, are the big IRs – Resorts World Manila (RWM), Solaire, City of Dreams Manila and Okada Manila – that have become the cornerstone of the market’s recent growth, having helped double the Philippines’ casino GGR in just four short years (and accelerating). Since RWM first opened its doors in 2009, and more so following Solaire’s arrival in 2013, the Philippines can now lay claim to luxury integrated resorts as good as any of those found in Asia’s gaming capital of Macau, or the better end of the Las Vegas Strip. But, perhaps surprisingly, the arrival of these glitzy properties and the high-end facilities they have to offer has not spelled the end for PAGCOR's properties. I say surprisingly because walking through the doors of a Casino Filipino feels a bit like stepping back in time – the worn carpet, smoke-filled air and slot machines from eons past very much at the opposite end of the spectrum from what Solaire’s gaming floor, for example, has to offer. Yet as PAGCOR chair AndreaDomingo told IAG when we sat down with her late last year, casino revenues from PAGCOR-run venues has been climbing at a similar rate to that of its IRs – prompting the regulator to put on hold its plan, announced in early 2018, to start selling off the 41 casinos it held at the time. The locals love them, Domingo told us, and judging by the crowded floors that greeted our recent visits to PAGCOR properties in Manila and Angeles it’s hard to argue any different. As for Clark, that’s another story altogether and one we visit in depth in this very issue. I was taken aback by both the size and quality of the casino floors at properties such Royce and Widus, both currently developing massive new expansions, as well as D’Heights, which opened earlier this year on an enormous bank of land measuring 309 hectares. I might add that, if golf is your thing, Clark wouldn’t be the worst place in the world to plan a lengthy getaway! Something tells me we’ll be writing a lot more about Clark, not to mention the Philippines as a whole, in the coming years.