Las Vegas Sands on target for December Singapore opening
Suggestions that the Sands Marina Bay integrated resort being built by Las Vegas Sands would not open as scheduled in 2009 were shot down last month when the company announced that the debut will indeed take place in December.
Bradley Stone, the company’s president of global operations and construction, said most of the property will be ready at that time.
In addition to the casino, the resort will feature an art-and-science museum, 300 retail stores, and three 55-story hotel towers, with more than 2,500 rooms, connected at the top with a pool, restaurant and observation deck.
Las Vegas Sands expects revenues from the project to rescue the company, currently mired in financial turmoil after construction was halted on its ambitious Cotai Strip development in Macau.
“What happened in Macau certainly won’t happen here in Singapore,” said Stone. “This project is fully funded.”
Already, however, tourism has declined in Singapore, even before the LVS casino or another owned by Malaysia’s Genting Corporation opens. The government expects as much as a 19 percent dip in tourism this year.
“We know the economic situation,” Nigel Roberts, president of Marina Bay Sands, told the Associated Press. “But we have a product that’s going to be stupendous and will override that.”
As for its difficult financial shape, LVS Chairman Sheldon Adelson says the sale of its Macau retail developments should keep the wolves at bay until the revenues from Singapore kick in.
“We can’t control very much the top line, but we can control the middle line and therefore the bottom line,” said Adelson.
While analysts bemoan the timing of the retail sales, Adelson claims to have 16 to 19 buyers interested in the Macau projects, which will keep the company in compliance with its lending requirements.
