Stanley Ho admitted to emergency room in HK – media report

Stanley Ho has been reportedly admitted to the emergency room in the Hong Kong Sanatorium & Hospital at 9:00 p.m. yesterday (Friday) after his health condition deteriorated, Apple Daily said.

Due to his fragile health condition Ho, 97, has been hospitalized with the report indicating that his health got worse at around 6:00 p.m. Friday. Despite initial treatment, some “organ failure episode” occurred and he was assisted in the emergency room.

According to Apple Daily, several members of the gaming tycoon’s daughters were seen arriving at the hospital, including Daisy Ho, Laurinda Ho and one of his granddaughters Faye Ho.

Ho’s fourth wife, local legislator and gaming businesswoman Angela Leong, was also spotted at the HK hospital, Macau Business reported today (Saturday). But when asked by reporters about Ho’s health condition, she denied to be there to visit him and said that she had only gone to the hospital “to handout lai sis.”

Other Chinese media quoted other family members saying that the patriarch was “okay.” Some denied even he was assisted in the emergency room.

TVBS website today (Saturday) reported that a battalion of Hong Kong media is waiting outside the hospital. They photographed Ho’s wife and children in various areas of the hospital.

The health of the founder of gaming group Sociedade de Turismo e Diversoes de Macau (STDM) has become increasingly fragile in recent years, prompting disputes between his heirs for control of his many assets.

In 2009 Ho fell in his apartment at Repulse Bay in Hong Kong, injuring his head and having to undergo brain surgery. He was discharged from the hospital half a year later, but having to return to hospital care in 2014.

In April last year, Stanley Ho became the latest Hong Kong billionaire – after Li Ka-shing – to step away from the empire he built, passing along the top roles at casino operator SJM Holdings Ltd. to his heirs, revealed a filing to HK stock exchange.

The casino tycoon retired as chairman and executive director of SJM in June 12. He became chairman emeritus. Daisy Ho, his 53-year-old daughter, took on his roles. Angela Leong, 57, Ho’s wife and SJM’s second-largest shareholder, acts as co-chair with another executive director.

“While Ho hasn’t been involved in the operations for many years, we can’t help but think that the proposed board structure is a bit messy,” said JPMorgan Chase & Co. analyst DS Kim in a note. “This complicated structure, in our view, leaves room for a potential power tussle within the board, given the lack of clear control,” he told Bloomberg.

Kim is looking for a clearer plan, such as a single chairperson, to fine-tune SJM’s corporate structure before the opening of the operator’s first property in Macau’s key Cotai district this year.

More recently, a new alliance emerged among some of Stanley Ho’s 17 children in the decade-long family battle for his Macau casino empire, and eldest daughter Pansy looks the likely victor.

As the Times reported in January, Ho announced that she had joined up with some siblings and the Henry Fok Foundation and would hold a combined 53 percent in STDM, which controls casino operator SJM Holdings Ltd. The alliance gives her the upper hand over Angela Leong, the fourth wife Stanley Ho, and her main rival in the battle for control of Macau’s original gaming company.

MDT/Agencies