{"id":20043,"date":"2021-07-08T14:27:37","date_gmt":"2021-07-08T14:27:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/?p=20043"},"modified":"2026-04-23T17:48:23","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T20:48:23","slug":"seoul-to-tighten-restrictions-as-covid-19-cases-rise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/seoul-to-tighten-restrictions-as-covid-19-cases-rise","title":{"rendered":"Seoul to tighten restrictions as Covid-19 cases rise"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Authorities in Seoul are considering tightening Covid-19 restrictions. Casinos are likely to be shut again if a lockdown is imposed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

South Korea.- Seoul is facing a fourth wave of Covid-19 cases, and the government is evaluating whether to\u00a0reintroduce tighter countermeasures.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Ministry of Health has reported\u00a01,275 new Covid-19 cases<\/strong>\u00a0in the last 24 hours in South Korea. Prime Minister Kim Boo-kyum<\/strong> has said that if cases continue rising in the next three days, he will impose the\u00a0strictest of social distancing levels<\/strong>, which means casinos will shut again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Under a total lockdown, people will be ordered to stay at home and only essential services will be allowed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to Reuters, the daily cases reported were the highest since last December. Just\u00a010 per cent of the population has been fully vaccinated<\/strong>, while only 30 per cent has received one dose.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are\u00a0three foreigner-only casinos located\u00a0<\/strong>in Seoul, all of them suffering from the lack of tourists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Grand Korea Leisure (GKL)<\/a>, operator of the Seven Luck Casino Millennium Seoul and Seven Luck Seoul Gangnam, reported casino sales of KRW40.29m <\/strong>in the first half of the year, down 69.7 per cent when compared to 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

GKL venues in Seoul\u00a0reopened in March<\/a>\u00a0at 20 per cent of normal capacity\u00a0<\/strong>after being closed since November 24. The company saw\u00a0casino sales<\/a>\u00a0fall by 62.4 per cent year-on-year to KRW184.46bn in 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Paradise Co<\/a>\u00a0is also struggling with a\u00a0lack of tourists. <\/strong>It reported\u00a0that sales fell 7.1 per cent\u00a0<\/strong>in the first quarter of the year to KRW96.6bn while\u00a0casino sales came in at KRW96.6bn<\/strong>, down 31.1 per cent sequentially and 51.6 per cent year-on-year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Authorities in Seoul are considering tightening Covid-19 restrictions. Casinos are likely to be shut again if a lockdown is imposed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":176,"featured_media":18629,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"is_press_release":false,"is_interview":false,"is_opinion":false,"focusai_summary":"Seoul authorities are considering reintroducing the strictest Covid-19 social distancing measures, which would mandate the closure of casinos. This potential lockdown exacerbates the operational challenges and financial downturn already experienced by foreigner-only casino operators like Grand Korea Leisure and Paradise Co, who have reported significant revenue declines due to a lack of international tourism.","focusai_entities":"Grand Korea Leisure, GKL, Paradise Co, Ministry of Health, Kim Boo-kyum","focusai_location":"Seoul, South Korea","focusai_target_profile":"ceo_executive (1.0), regulator (0.8), compliance_legal (0.7), operator_casino (1.0), marketing_crm (0.7), payments_fraud_aml (0.7), investor_analyst (1.0), supplier_vendor (0.8), journalist_researcher (1.0)","focusai_suggestions":[{"label":"Operational Mitigation Strategies","query":"Beyond immediate closures, what long-term operational mitigation strategies are GKL and Paradise Co deploying to address sustained low international tourism and potential future pandemic-related disruptions?"},{"label":"Capital Market Implications","query":"What are the projected capital market implications for South Korean integrated resorts, specifically regarding debt covenants, liquidity, and potential equity raises, should these stringent restrictions persist?"}],"footnotes":""},"categories":[28,16338],"tags":[23907],"class_list":["post-20043","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-casino-news","category-east-asia-news","tag-land-based-casino"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20043","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/176"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20043"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20043\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20064,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20043\/revisions\/20064"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18629"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20043"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20043"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20043"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}