According to gaming regulation experts, slot lounges located outside casinos could be in a similar legal position to satellite casinos.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Macau.- Two gambling regulation experts have told GGRAsia that\u00a0Macau\u2019s gaming law amendment bill<\/a>\u00a0could put some of the city’s independent slot machine operators in a similar legal position to the city’s satellite casinos.<\/p>\n\n\n\n All six Macau gaming franchisees operate slot machine lounges, most of which are located inside casinos. Five such lounges\u00a0under the Mocha Club brand are classified by regulators as non-casino slot machines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ant\u00f3nio Lobo Vilela<\/strong>, an expert on gaming law said that current administrative regulations allowed slot machine lounges to operate in non-casino venues, but administrative regulations will be overridden by new amendments to gambling laws.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As of December 31, there were eight Mocha clubs active. One is located in Altira Macau, a casino owned by\u00a0Melco Resorts<\/a>; two are in satellite casino hotels; two are connected to corresponding premises in non-gaming hotels, and three are connected to other business premises.<\/p>\n\n\n\n All six casino operators in Macau have been confirmed to have applied to extend their franchises until another tender later this year. Current licences were due to expire in June, but last month Lei Wai Nong<\/strong>, Macau\u2019s secretary for economy and finance, confirmed that licences will be extended until December 31<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Macau\u2019s gaming law amendment bill, which is still in debate, would allow up to six gaming concessions<\/a> with a length of 10 years and the possibility of a 3-year extension. A final reading of the gaming law amendment bill<\/a> is expected by June.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" According to gaming regulation experts, slot lounges located outside casinos could be in a similar legal position to satellite casinos.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":176,"featured_media":21513,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"is_press_release":false,"is_interview":false,"is_opinion":false,"focusai_summary":"Macau's proposed gaming law amendment bill could reclassify independent slot lounges, such as Mocha Club, placing them in a similar legal position to satellite casinos, overriding current administrative regulations. Concurrently, all six Macau gaming franchisees have secured an extension of their concessions until December 31, 2022, ahead of a new tender process for up to six 10-year licenses.","focusai_entities":"GGRAsia, Ant\u00f3nio Lobo Vilela, Mocha Club, Melco Resorts, Lei Wai Nong","focusai_location":"Macau","focusai_target_profile":"ceo_executive (1.0), regulator (1.0), compliance_legal (1.0), operator_casino (1.0), investor_analyst (1.0), supplier_vendor (0.7), journalist_researcher (1.0)","focusai_suggestions":[{"label":"Slot Lounge Reclassification Impact?","query":"What are the specific operational and fiscal implications for independent slot lounge operators if they are reclassified as satellite casinos under the new gaming law?"},{"label":"Concession Term Investment Strategy?","query":"How might the proposed 10-year concession term with a 3-year extension option impact long-term capital investment strategies and market competition among the six Macau operators?"}],"footnotes":""},"categories":[16338,156],"tags":[23911,23906],"class_list":["post-28908","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-east-asia-news","category-regulation-news","tag-gambling-regulation","tag-macau-casinos"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28908","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=28908"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28908\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28916,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28908\/revisions\/28916"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21513"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}All Macau casino operators have requested extension of concessions<\/h2>\n\n\n\n