The most “george” figure in the casino industry last year would have to be Steve Wynn. Rank-and-file employees at Wynn Macau received a month’s salary as an end-of-year bonus. Senior management is ineligible for bonuses. Now, this is part of previously agreed-to bonus plan running through next year. However, if there was ever a time when Wynn could take cover and renege on the pretext of a poor business year, 2015 was it, especially as Wynn Resorts has taken it on the chin in VIP play. But Wynn kept his/its word and is to be commended for it.
The generosity certainly compares favorably to the two-tier bonus system implemented by Stanley Ho‘s underlings at Sociedade de Jogos de Macau. Employees making $2,495 or less got two months salary. But those 
in the higher-earning brackets would get $5,000 or 1.5X a month’s salary, whichever was more. Them that has gets in Stanley Ho’s world. Incidentally, an affiliate of the Macau Federation of Trade Unions has chosen this low ebb of the Macanese economy as the moment to press for higher wages for casino workers. Good luck with that. (Especially when service quality is on the decline.) Other than SJM CEO Ambrose So (left) telling a local paper he’d think about it, no casino company has shown even the hint of an inclination to bust out some wage increases.
Macao‘s new top gaming regulator took a scythe to the crowded junket industry, felling 35 licensees for withholding financial information. This would bring the number of junketeers operating in Macao to a still-robust 
147. Union Gaming Securities analyst Grant Govertsen opined that the unlucky 35 were probably low-hanging fruit anyway, due to fall alongside declining business. He predicted, though, that the junket market would continue to consolidate in 2016. Meanwhile, in the ongoing scandal at L’Arc, it is reported that the theft of $13 million may have been an inside job, reflecting no discredit upon L’Arc’s junket operators.
Sanford Bernstein analysts said the revelations meant one thing: tighter government regulation of junkets. Indeed, new Gaming Inspection & Coordination Bureau Director Paulo Martins Chan, interviewed by Radio Macau, said tighter scrutiny of junketeers’ financial probity would be forthcoming. And if all this weren’t enough bad news, junket operators are having trouble collecting gambling debts. VIP players are reported to be welshing on as much as 80% of their debt. You can bet that Nevada-based casino companies are quietly thanking Silver State regulators for barring them from extending credit to players in Macao.
* Having conquered the U.S., tribal gaming’s biggest players are turning their eyes to Europe. A coalition of some of the biggest tribal-gaming associations has been hammered together by Pechanga.net‘s Victor Rocha, who’s also assembled a heavyweight panel of experts to appear at the prestigious International Casino Exhibition in London next month. Our advice to our brethren across the sea: Resistance is futile.
