{"id":30427,"date":"2022-06-03T03:49:25","date_gmt":"2022-06-03T06:49:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/?p=30427"},"modified":"2026-04-23T08:07:52","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T11:07:52","slug":"counsel-makes-final-remarks-in-nsw-star-entertainment-inquiry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/counsel-makes-final-remarks-in-nsw-star-entertainment-inquiry","title":{"rendered":"Counsel makes final remarks in NSW Star Entertainment inquiry"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Counsel Naomi Sharp SC has concluded her arguments, saying that Star facilitated money laundering, organised crime, fraud and foreign interference at its Sydney casino.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Australia.- The New South Wales inquiry into The Star Entertainment Group has today (Friday) heard the final statements of Counsel Naomi Sharp SC<\/strong>. Sharp explained the main reasons why she believes that\u00a0The Star Entertainment Group<\/a>\u00a0is unsuitable to hold a casino licence in Sydney.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sharp reaffirmed that the company enabled suspicious money laundering, organised crime, fraud and foreign interference at its Sydney casino. Furthermore, she claimed that the Star was prepared to create false documents and mislead NAB about payments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Wednesday<\/a>, she said more than 1,300 VIP guests used banned China Union Pay cards in almost 2,000 transactions from 2013 to March 2020, despite the practice being prohibited by the card operator.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shap also accused the casino operator of not being transparent and of repeatedly violating the Casino Control Law by letting high rollers use Chinese debit cards to get cash to play. The inquiry had heard that around AU$900m was processed on the CUP cards<\/a> before CUP terminals in Star venues were disabled in 2020. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As for claims regarding tax, Sharp said there was insufficient evidence that the Star had moved clients from its international to the local program to\u00a0minimise the tax payable to the NSW government<\/a>. However, she said there was evidence that customers were misclassified and that the Star may have neglected to notify regulators of underpayment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She also referred to the resignation of many members of the board<\/strong> and stated: “Merely parting company with a number of senior executives and embarking on a program of board renewal is not enough to change the culture of the organisation.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The inquiry will continue on June 14<\/strong>\u00a0when The Star is to respond to the submissions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Counsel Naomi Sharp SC has concluded her arguments, saying that Star facilitated money laundering, organised crime, fraud and foreign interference at its Sydney casino.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":176,"featured_media":18904,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"is_press_release":false,"is_interview":false,"is_opinion":false,"focusai_summary":"Counsel Naomi Sharp SC concluded arguments in the NSW inquiry, asserting The Star Entertainment Group facilitated money laundering, organised crime, fraud, and foreign interference at its Sydney casino. Sharp detailed violations including the use of banned China Union Pay cards and misleading financial institutions, questioning Star's suitability for its casino license. The inquiry highlighted governance failures and potential regulatory non-compliance, with Star expected to respond on June 14.","focusai_entities":"Naomi Sharp SC, The Star Entertainment Group, NAB, China Union Pay","focusai_location":"Australia, New South Wales, Sydney","focusai_target_profile":"ceo_executive (1.0), regulator (1.0), compliance_legal (1.0), operator_casino (0.9), tech_data (0.7), payments_fraud_aml (1.0), investor_analyst (1.0), supplier_vendor (0.7), journalist_researcher (0.9)","focusai_suggestions":[{"label":"License Revocation Impact","query":"What is the projected financial and operational impact on The Star Entertainment Group's market position and shareholder value if the NSW Independent Casino Commission recommends license revocation or imposes severe operational restrictions?"},{"label":"Governance Framework Efficacy","query":"Beyond board renewal, what specific enhancements to The Star Entertainment Group's corporate governance framework and internal control systems are required to demonstrably address the systemic compliance failures identified by the inquiry?"}],"footnotes":""},"categories":[16336,156,158],"tags":[23871],"class_list":["post-30427","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-australasia-news","category-regulation-news","category-slider-home","tag-the-star-entertainment-group"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30427","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=30427"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30427\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30451,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30427\/revisions\/30451"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18904"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30427"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30427"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30427"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}