Macau casino operator SJM Holdings lost over $182m in the first half of 2020 and the company doesn’t expect a return to pre-pandemic normal anytime this year.  

On Tuesday, the Hong Kong-listed SJM reported generating revenue of HK$4.37b (US$564.4m) in the six months ending June 30, nearly three-quarters below the sum generated in the same period last year. Earnings were a negative HK$1b and the company booked a net loss of HK$1.41b versus a profit of HK$1.68b in H1 2019.

SJM’s VIP revenue slid 81.6% to HK$1.37b in H1 despite the hold rate increasing more than half a point to 3.67%, as high-roller turnover tumbled 84.5%. At the end of H1, SJM had 192 VIP tables in action with 14 junket operators, down from 275 tables and 15 junkets at the end of 2019. SJM’s share of Macau’s overall VIP revenue fell more than two points from H1 2019 to just 8.6%.

Over at the mass market tables, revenue fell 73.5% to HK$3.3b as the number of tables in action fell by around 40%. But SJM fared better than some of its rivals, as its share of Macau’s overall mass table business rose 3.8 points year-on-year to 22%.

There hasn’t been a British U.S. Open winner for eight years, but with the Coronavirus pandemic meaning the famous tournament at Flushing Meadow could be without players such as Rafael Nadal, Roger Federer and Stan Wawrinka, could Andy Murray return to claim his second U.S. Open Mens Singles title?

In an interview with the British Metro newspaper, Murray has spoken about his desire to play the event, bringing back memories of the Scottish superstar’s epic five-set victory over Novak Djokovic in 2012.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgVJazH8khA?feature=oembed]

Murray, whose return from a serious hip injury has seen him miss 10 months compared to the six months that his peers have been absent for, a gap that means less with each passing week, has been involved in this week’s Battle of the Brits tournament.

The shortest and possibly busiest summer transfer window of the Premier League era is already open and with clubs such as Chelsea, Manchester United and Arsenal reportedly close to long-term targets, the changes coming to the greatest league on the planet could be massive.

The Done Deals

There have already been some deals done this summer, of course, with the players involved either about to pose in their new team’s 2020/21 home kit or on a plane to their new hom instead.

Adam Lallana has swapped the Costa Del Merseyside for… er, the South Coast, as 32-year-old former Southampton player – who has played just eight Premier League games in three seasons on Merseyside – has somehow been given a three-year deal by The Seagulls. It’s like waking up and a winning lottery ticket floating through your open window.

Back in December of 2010, an emotional Welshman captured one of the world’s most coveted titles, that of EPT Prague champion, when he topped the 563-entry field and won €640,000. Just three months later, Roberto Romanello had won a WPTT Main Event too, taking down the Bratislava title for €140,685 after he escaped the clutches of 209 opponents.

Winning poker’s fabled ‘Triple Crown’ was two-thirds of the way done, but it would take Romanello nine years to finally clinch the World Series of Poker title that earned him the golden bracelet as well as $212,613 for outlasting a field of 922 entries. We caught up with the family man who is a poker hero to many in order to find out how it felt. 

Event #39 of this year’s WSOP Online Series took place on GGPoker and saw Romanello become just the ninth player in poker history to win the Triple Crown.

It’s been a long time coming but Roberto Romanello has completed poker’s coveted triple Crown, becoming only the ninth player in history to win a WSOP bracelet, WPT Main Event and an EPT Main Event, but how does the feeling from the night before last compare to his previous victories?

If I were an Eldorado shareholder, the following sentence from MarketWatch would scare the proverbial pants off my proverbial self:

A Nevada company that started in 1973 with a single hotel-casino in Reno announced Monday it has completed a $17.3 billion buyout of Caesars Entertainment Corp. and will take the iconic company’s name going forward as the largest casino owner in the world.

Let’s go back 12 and a half years? This is from the Las Vegas Review Journal, January 29, 2008:

Harrah’s Entertainment’s first day as a private company pretty much lived up to what the company promised two months ago: “a change in ownership, but not a change in direction.”

Keith Cozza has resigned from the board of Caesars Entertainement. The CEO of Icahn Enterprises left abruptly after a Monday morning announcement with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The July 27 announcement stated:

“On July 24, 2020, Keith Cozza informed the Executive Chairman of the Board of Directors (the “Board”) of Caesars Entertainment, Inc., a Delaware corporation (the “Company”), that he is resigning from the Board effective immediately. Mr. Cozza’s resignation was not the result of any disagreement with the Company on any matter relating to the Company’s operations, policies or practices.”

Cozza was one of three representatives for Carl Icahn on Caesars’ board. The 83-year-old billionaire gained the largest stake of any shareholder in the company in early 2019, and was an important player in arranging the sale of the company to Eldorado. He remains the largest shareholder in the new combined company.

It took what seemed like an eternity for MLB team owners and players to reach an agreement on how to get the 2020 season going and, finally, the games started last Thursday. As the second major sports league in the US to see its players get back in uniform (MLS was the first), it was a reason for sports fans everywhere to rejoice. The sudden surge in happiness may be short-lived, thanks to a potential COVID-19 outbreak in baseball, but the weekend proved to be highly lucrative for fans, as well as sportsbooks. Online sports gambling operator Bodog saw a lot of success this past weekend, most of which was provided by MLB wagers.

MLB gamblers gave Bodog 55.97% of its action over the weekend, followed by Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) in a distant second with just 11.79%. Soccer was once again a strong performer, providing just over 15% of the wagers between MLS, Italy Serie A and the English Premier League. Also making the top ten were golf, with the 3M Open, table tennis, the NFL 2020 Sims league and basketball.

As far as individual events go, the 3M Open captured the most with 16.56%. Michael Thompson took the victory with a 4-under-67 performance that allowed him to win by two strokes ahead of Adam Long. It was his second PGA Tour victory and came seven years after his first. Thompson was one of the favorites to win, and had odds listed at +400 going into the contest.

The rest of the action among the top ten events all centered on MLB, with the exception of the UFC fight between Robert Whittaker and Darren Till. The game between the San Francisco Giants and the LA Dodgers attracted 22.22% of the wagers, with the New York Yankees-Washington Nationals game a close second at 12.15%. The Giants and the Dodgers played four games and split the wins down the middle. The Yankees won two of the three games to start the season strong, but were forced to call off their Monday night game against the Philadelphia Phillies because of a COVID-19 threat after the Phillies took on the Miami Marlins – 11 players and two staff members with the franchise have tested positive for the coronavirus.

Over the course of the past several years, ransomware attacks have become the new norm with hackers. They find computer systems – personal, corporate or other – with security flaws that allow them to gain access, and then deposit code inside the systems that allows them to take control. Not until the system owner or administrator pays up – usually through cryptocurrency – is network control released. However, thanks to an initiative launched by Europol a few years ago, these hackers have found their efforts to be blocked in many cases. So far, the No More Ransom decryption tool repository has helped victims refrain from having to turn over around $632 million in ransom demands. 

The repository has been around for four years now, according to Europol, and has attracted 4.2 million visitors since then. Those visitors are likely victims, contributors to the repository or just curious Netizens looking to see what’s going on (or, possibly, hackers looking to see how they can alter their scams). However, there are now 163 partners that have contributed to the library of ransomware unblocking tools available through the repository. Over the last year, 28 new tools have been added, and 140 types of ransomware can now be decrypted. 

Emisisoft has been one of the primary contributors, with the malware lab having provided 54 different tools to date. Cointelegraph was able to speak with a threat analyst, Brett Callow, with the company, who asserted that the tools are helping numerous people recover data “without needing to pay the ransom, and that means less money in the pockets of cybercriminals.” He added, “The project also helps people recover data that would otherwise permanently be lost. The loss of things like wedding photos and videos of babies’ first steps is, obviously, heartbreaking for people, and being able to help them get those things back is an important part of what No More Ransom does.”

As the crypto ecosystem matures, more tools are being added to help it grow. There has never been a monetary system created that didn’t have to have serious oversight and controls put in place, thanks to a never-ending list of scammers, fraudsters and charlatans, and crypto is getting the same attention. Programs like No More Ransom and the number of independent companies involved in governing the crypto space are providing solutions that have escaped even fiat regulators and are bringing more control to crypto than ever seen with any fiat alternative. 

In the fast moving world of gambling, sometimes you might miss news that could be important to you. To make sure you’re all caught up on gaming industry news, be it online or brick and mortar, we’re rounding up the some of the announcements and partnerships from the last week that you might have missed.

Don’t miss out on all of the latest announcements. Our Press Release section is updated constantly

Nolimit City goes live on Rootz Ltd new flagship brand, Caxino Casino

Taking charge in the wake of the amazing reception to the first flagship brand, Wildz, the Malta based multi-brand operator now sets its sites on a new brand with more of the same greatness that made Wildz the leading newbie player in the market. Caxino Casino has already marked itself as a big contender in the game.

Several months ago, employees of Macau’s casinos voiced concern over the possibility of losing their jobs permanently. The coronavirus pandemic was taking its toll on the city and all casinos had to be completely shut down temporarily in order to prevent the virus from spreading. For a region that relies heavily on gambling for its survival, suddenly finding all of its properties closed projected an eerie sight that didn’t instill a lot of confidence. While Macau has been able to start to recover, the short-term fallout of COVID-19 will continue to be felt, especially in the employment numbers. The latest figures provided by the city’s government show a huge drop in the number of workers with steady jobs from the first to the second quarter of 2020.

In the first quarter of the year, there were about 87,500 employees working for Macau’s casino, gaming and junket operators. By the end of the second quarter, that number fell to 82,300 as 5,200 people found themselves not able to return to their jobs, according to Macau’s Statistics and Census Service (DSEC, for its Portuguese acronym). That coincides with the casino industry’s gross gaming revenue (GGR), which is currently flatlined at 97% of what it was a year ago. In each of the three months of the second quarter, GGR has been cut by over 90% year-on-year. 

Macau leaders and gaming regulators had tried to keep the market segment motivated and even tried to convince operators to not take drastic measures. However, in some cases, the inevitable happened, and companies were forced to shut down operations as the money quit flowing. There have been a number of junkets scrambling to cut their losses and some have already taken measures. Golden Group, which has a number of VIP clubs in Macau, is going to close all three of its clubs at the Hotel Lisboa as of the end of this month. 

The DSEC adds that the number of people currently out of work in Macau increased from 400 to 10,100 in the second quarter, with many of those having previously worked in the gaming industry, or in closely related fields, such as restaurants and bars. In terms of underemployed numbers, there are now 13,900 who fall into this category, an increase of 3,300. These figures equate to increases of 2.1% and 2.5%, respectively, between the first two quarters of the year, with 9.7% of the population now out of work.