Now that Sen. Harry Reid (D) has one foot out the door on Capitol Hill, he’s turning on the casino companies — particularly Caesars Entertainment — that helped him stay in 
power five years ago. Just when Sen. Lindsey Graham‘s mooted bill to outlaw Internet gaming seemed to have quietly evaporated, Reid stirred new life into the issue. While he used to favor a carve-out for online poker, Reid’s abandoning even that token form of support for Big Gaming. “I haven’t made up my mind — but I’m going to look closely into banning it totally. I’m going to take a hard look at it. It would be something I would certainly consider strongly.” Thanks a lot. To paraphrase an NRA chestnut, if Internet poker is outlawed, only outlaws will play Internet poker.
With friends like this, who needs Sheldon Adelson? Reid is parroting Las Vegas Sands bogeyman talking points, claiming that the Silver State failed in its regulation of ‘Net betting. (Example, please?) Fortunately, the congressional legislation faces complexities such as interfering with online state lotteries (which often use servers across state lines) and possibly having to grandfather existing ‘Net betting in Delaware, Nevada and New Jersey. Considering the lengths to which MGM Resorts International and Caesars stuck out their necks to support Reid in 2010, they’d be right if they thought of him as an ungrateful bastard.
* Having failed to meet a March 31 completion deadline — or even get its Philippines megaresort project halfway done — Kazuo Okada‘s Tiger Resorts Leisure & Entertainment forfeited $2 million in guarantees and has its license in jeopardy of being 
suspended. Okada wants to push completion of the project, which has already been underway since 2012, back into mid-2017, due to design changes. Tiger claims to be 56% finished but regulatory body Pagcor (which doubles as a casino operator) isn’t buying it.
While Caesars, leaping at every opportunity in sight, would love to penetrate the Philippine market, Pagcor CEO Cristino Naguiat put Gary Loveman on “hold,” citing a rolling wave of megaresort projects that are gradually filling up the Entertainment City zone, already host to Melco Crown Entertainment and Genting Group casinos. Although Caesars’ interest in the Philippines can partly be attributed to recent corporate desperation, the once-untouchable territory may be become more attractive to major American operators in the near future, as Pagcor cleans up its formerly shady image (“Naguiat’s predecessor and several colleagues have been indicted for graft”). Also, governmental transparency in the Philippines, once rated well behind China‘s has now caught up with and surpassed Peking.
Whatever their inclinations, U.S. casino executives will have to hold off supplicating Naguiat’s successor until 2018, when two more megaresorts open in Entertainment City and the freeze on new projects is lifted … assuming that Okada has gotten his act together by then.
* Adelson and K.T. Lim of Genting Group can sleep a little better tonight: A high-ranking Singapore minister has told the country’s parliament that the government has “no plans” to entertain new casino bids when the Sands/Genting duopoly expires in 2017. A lot could change between then and now but the Singaporean administration has always shown an abundance of caution toward its casino industry. “The government would instead focus on working with the two existing licensees to ensure their attractions and services continue to enhance the country’s tourism appeal,” reports GGR Asia.
