Hong Kong’s Secretary for Culture, Sports and Tourism has said the government is discussing a proposal with the Hong Kong Jockey Club.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Hong Kong.- Kevin Yeung Yun-hung<\/strong>, Hong Kong’s secretary for culture, sports and tourism, has said that a proposal to relax the age restriction for entry to horse racing events is being discussed with Hong Kong Jockey Club (HKJC). Speaking in a radio interview cited by the South China Morning Post, he said the aim would be to increase the city’s appeal as a horse racing tourist destination.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Under current regulations, under 18s<\/strong> are prohibited from entering premises where bets are accepted. Yeung Yun-hung said he believed there needed to be a limit but said authorities had to analyse the situation. He said the government and the HKJC shared the goal of promoting horse racing as a prominent tourist attraction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In Hong Kong Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu\u2019s recent policy address, the government proposed developing tourism products, including yachts, pandas, horse racing and cultural and ecotourism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the 2023\/24 financial year<\/a>, the HKJC posted a turnover of HK$304.9bn (US$39.18bn), up slightly when compared to the previous financial year<\/a>. Net margin was down 10.5 per cent to HK$14.8bn (US$1.90bn). Racing turnover fell 3.1 per cent year-on-year to HK$136.1bn (US$17.5bn). A total of 89 race meetings were held in the 2023\/24 season, two more than the previous year. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Football betting turnover reached a record high of HK$160.3bn (US$20.61bn), up 2.2 per cent year-on-year. The increase was attributed to additional fixtures, the introduction of 24-hour operations, an expansion of in-play offerings, and the launch of new products such as Same Game All Up and Early Settlement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n However, due to the Club\u2019s payment of an additional HK$2.4bn (US$0.31bn) in Special Football Betting Duty annually for five years starting from April 2023, profit from football decreased by 16.6 per cent to HK$8.1bn (US$1.04bn). Turnover from the Mark Six lottery was up 13.3 per cent year-on-year to HK$8.5bn (US$1.09bn).<\/p>\n\n\n\n The HKJC contributed a record HK$40.1bn (US$5.16bn) to the community: HK$29.9bn (US$3.84bn) in betting duty, profits tax and Lotteries Fund contributions and HK$10.2bn (US$1.31bn) in approved charity donations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Hong Kong’s Secretary for Culture, Sports and Tourism has said the government is discussing a proposal with the Hong Kong Jockey Club.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":176,"featured_media":17273,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"is_press_release":false,"is_interview":false,"is_opinion":false,"focusai_summary":"The Hong Kong government is discussing with the Hong Kong Jockey Club a proposal to relax age restrictions for horse racing event entry to boost tourism. Concurrently, the HKJC reported a slight increase in overall turnover to US$39.18bn for FY2023\/24, despite a 10.5% decline in net margin and a 3.1% drop in racing turnover. Record football betting turnover was offset by a new Special Football Betting Duty, impacting profit.","focusai_entities":"Kevin Yeung Yun-hung, Hong Kong Jockey Club, South China Morning Post, John Lee Ka-chiu","focusai_location":"Hong Kong","focusai_target_profile":"ceo_executive (0.9), regulator (0.95), compliance_legal (0.9), operator_casino (0.95), affiliate_publisher (0.7), product_ux (0.75), tech_data (0.7), marketing_crm (0.85), investor_analyst (0.95), supplier_vendor (0.7), journalist_researcher (0.9)","focusai_suggestions":[{"label":"Age Restriction Impact","query":"What is the projected GGR uplift and demographic shift anticipated from relaxing the age restriction for horse racing entry, and what specific responsible gambling measures will be enhanced to mitigate associated risks?"},{"label":"Football Betting Strategy","query":"How will the HKJC's strategy for football betting, particularly regarding new product development and 24-hour operations, evolve to sustain growth given the significant impact of the Special Football Betting Duty on net profit?"}],"footnotes":""},"categories":[16338,156],"tags":[4256,233],"class_list":["post-777020051","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-east-asia-news","category-regulation-news","tag-horse-racing","tag-sports-betting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/777020051","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=777020051"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/777020051\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":777020088,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/777020051\/revisions\/777020088"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17273"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=777020051"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=777020051"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=777020051"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}HJKC posts full-year turnover of US$39.18bn<\/h2>\n\n\n\n