This week’s casino news is focused on COVID-19 and how it is still impacting casinos. We’ve got a trio of stories from around the world as different casinos have different challenges with the pandemic.
Resorts World Manila Opens New Hotel
There was huge anticipation for the Resorts World (KLSE: GENTING) opening in Las Vegas and now there’s similar hype around their newest opening in the Philippines. Resorts World Manila has fully cut the ribbon on the new Hotel Okura. This addition comes shortly after the country announced that all COVID-19 restrictions would be lifted, so now customers can actually visit. This marks the expansion of the Okura Hotels & Resorts chain, which continues to grow larger. They already operate 25 hotels across North America, Europe, Japan, and Asia-Pacific.
The Philippines was hit hard by the pandemic over these past few years with deaths, lockdowns and various other challenges. Their entire economy felt the weight of the restrictions throughout this time but thankfully the casinos opened back up last November.
Now, the government told everybody that all lockdowns across the country would be lifted for the time being. It does appear that while there was a small spike in positive cases this week, the current variant is not making people as sick as previous versions. The overall number of cases is still minimal compared to what they were getting previously. There are no concerns over the Philippines reinstating these restrictions after a few bad days at the moment, so that’s good news for Resorts World.
Singapore Casinos Prepared To Remove COVID-19 Restrictions
Speaking of COVID-19 restrictions in Asia, it’s been announced that all COVID-19 related restrictions that have been in place in Singapore will be lifted. Singapore has had to deal with extended restrictions dating back to February of 2020. They were labeled a “code orange” and had to work under consistent temperature checks, travel restrictions, limited capacities and a few others. Now they’re free to move around unrestricted.
On top of those other previously labeled restrictions, residents will now longer be required to show vaccination status. These checks are going to be taken away from a ton of properties around the country.
Despite all of this being seemingly positive news, the Health Minister isn’t as enthusiastic. He warned the people that if another wave of COVID comes marching through, all of the restrictions would likely be reinstated. As it stands right now, the number of COVID-19 positive cases in Singapore has been steadily decreasing.
Circus Circus Las Vegas Casino Suffers Loss In Insurance Lawsuit
Circus Circus Las Vegas has found itself on the losing end in the courtroom this past week. The casino had started a lawsuit against the American International Group because they felt as if the insurance company should have been liable for all COVID-19 interruptions and impacts on revenue. Unfortunately, the court decided against Circus Circus and sided with the AIG.
This isn’t the first casino to file a lawsuit against an insurance company since the pandemic first started. Since all of these lawsuits have started, all insurance companies have held strong in the stance that they won’t be paying COVID-19 compensation. The courts have ruled in favor of this idea in each lawsuit so far. It’s quite disappointing for a number of casinos as they figured that that’s what they’re paying insurance for. However, this proved to be something unexpected and not part of their coverage.
This is just one of many lawsuits of the type that will come out in the coming years. Estimations say that there are 240 federal COVID-19 property insurance appeals that are still waiting to go through. It doesn’t look like the casinos will be winning any of them if the past cases were any indication, but stranger things have happened.
