James Packer has told the WA Royal Commission into Crown Resorts that he didn’t attend board meetings for almost four years and failed in his oversight of corporate governance at Crown Perth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Australia.-\u00a0Western Australia\u2019s Royal Commission<\/strong>‘s\u00a0latest session had Crown’s former chair and biggest shareholder giving evidence via video link. During the public hearing, Packer admitted to\u00a0Patricia Cahill<\/strong>, counsel assisting the Royal Commission, that he failed to attend board meetings for nearly four years after moving overseas and failed to ensure the board had a written charter.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n He said he did not attend the Burswood board meeting after leaving the country in 2013<\/strong>, but continued to receive news about casino operations from Barry Felsted, Crown\u2019s then head of Australian resorts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cahill then asked Packer if there was anyone appointed to the Board who had financial crime risks management experience and anti-money laundering expertise and Packer said he didn’t believe there was. He admitted there were many oversights and things that should have been done differently.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Packer was also asked about\u00a0Crown Perth’s<\/a>\u00a0adoption of the name\u00a0\u201cRiverbank Investments\u201d<\/strong>\u00a0for its bank account to allow Chinese high rollers to mask their transactions. Packer noted that the company was named employer of the year in 2015 and he believed Crown’s corporate culture has been achieving good things but that at some point “the culture slipped.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n He said he didn’t believe Crown Perth had been involved in money laundering<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Packer owns 37 per cent of Crown through his company, Consolidated Press Holdings, but the Royal Commission of Victoria recommended that he be forced to sell down to 5 per cent by September 2024, something that Parker did not object to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In March, the\u00a0Western Australian government<\/a>\u00a0announced a Royal Commission to\u00a0examine the suitability of Crown Resorts<\/strong>\u00a0to continue holding a casino gaming licence for Crown Perth. The decision came after the Gaming and Wagering Commission of Western Australia (GWC)\u00a0asked for an independent inquiry<\/a>\u00a0into Crown Resorts following the\u00a0Bergin<\/a> inquiry in New South Wales.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Crown Resorts has reached an agreement to settle the shareholder class action against the company\u00a0<\/strong>that started in December 2017 in the Federal Court of Australia, referenced as Zantran Pty Limited versus Crown Resorts Limited. The total settlement amount was\u00a0AU$125m (US$94.3m) inclusive of interest and costs<\/strong>.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n The legal action was brought by Australian law firm Maurice Blackburn, who claimed the casino operator failed to inform shareholders about its marketing campaign in China<\/strong> which later led to the arrest of 19 of its employees and a sharp fall in share price. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Through a statement, the company said: “Crown’s Board of Directors determined that the agreement to settle the Proceeding was a commercial decision made in the best interests of Crown and its shareholders.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" James Packer has told the WA Royal Commission into Crown Resorts that he didn’t attend board meetings for almost four years and failed in his oversight of corporate governance at Crown Perth.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":176,"featured_media":19861,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"is_press_release":false,"is_interview":false,"is_opinion":false,"focusai_summary":"James Packer admitted to the Western Australian Royal Commission significant corporate governance failures at Crown Resorts, including prolonged absence from board meetings and a lack of anti-money laundering (AML) expertise on the board. This comes as Crown settled a AU$125m shareholder class action related to its past China marketing practices, amidst ongoing regulatory scrutiny over its casino licenses in Australia.","focusai_entities":"James Packer, Crown Resorts, Crown Perth, Consolidated Press Holdings, Patricia Cahill, Barry Felsted, Royal Commission of Victoria, Western Australian government, Gaming and Wagering Commission of Western Australia (GWC), Bergin inquiry, Zantran Pty Limited, Maurice Blackburn","focusai_location":"Australia, Western Australia, Perth, New South Wales, China","focusai_target_profile":"ceo_executive (0.95), regulator (1.0), compliance_legal (1.0), operator_casino (0.95), payments_fraud_aml (0.98), investor_analyst (0.98), supplier_vendor (0.75), journalist_researcher (0.97)","focusai_suggestions":[{"label":"Crown Governance Enhancements?","query":"What specific governance framework enhancements will Crown Resorts implement to address the Royal Commission's findings and restore regulatory confidence in its B2C licensing suitability?"},{"label":"Packer Divestment Impact?","query":"How will the forced divestment of James Packer's significant stake impact Crown's strategic direction, capital structure, and potential for future M&A or expansion initiatives within the gaming verticals?"}],"footnotes":""},"categories":[16336,157,158],"tags":[14657],"class_list":["post-24039","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-australasia-news","category-business-news","category-slider-home","tag-crown-resorts"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24039","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=24039"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24039\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24057,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24039\/revisions\/24057"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19861"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24039"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24039"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24039"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Crown reaches US$94m shareholder settlement agreement<\/h2>\n\n\n\n