Royal Dragon with no license to operate

Paulo Martins Chan

The Royal Dragon Casino is scheduled for its inauguration today but does not yet have a license to operate.  The director of the Gaming Inspection and Coordination Bureau (DICJ), Paulo Martins Chan, confirmed that he was still studying wheter to approve the license yesterday at the sidelines of the press conference. “We are now stydying every single aspect of the application, including a venue inspection and some paperwork,” he said.

The new property is owned by Chan Meng Kam, a businessman and former lawmaker. Paulo Martins Chan said that, “the last time [Friday] that I spoke about this we haven’t received any request for licensing, since then, I can confirm that we already received [yesterday] that request and that the process is now following its normal steps. I still didn’t get the approval.” The DICJ chief clarified that the paperwork was still being processed.

Located at a renovated commercial building in the ZAPE area, the casino is reportedly planned to open today under a SJM Holdings license.

The DICJ chief also noted that it was certain that no new tables would be approved for such development. “When it opens, it is a must to resort to transfer of tables allocated previously to other properties,” Chan stated.

Regarding media reports that a gaming company in Macau was prepared to integrate digital currencies into the local gaming industry (see more on page 2), Chan said that “none of the companies mentioned are gaming-related companies or companies responsible for the production of slot machines, and for the time being, it is not possible for these to be related any of the companies in the Macau gaming sector.” Regarding the use of Bitcoins to play online games, he said that “Macau never authorized any form of online gaming, so any of the forms of gaming are illegal.”

Chan also noted that such media reports raised the possibility of investors in cryptocurrency possibly becoming “partners” in local gaming concessions, but noted that the “criteria to be partners in gaming concessions are very strict, is not that simple.”