New shakeup at Melco; Adelson goes tropical

Those of you for whom Melco Crown Entertainment has been a bumpy ride are about to experience additional turbulence. CFO Simon Dewhurst has stepped down and MPEL board has — rather late in the day — decided “to find a CFO with more of a gaming operating background (versus Mr. Dewhurst’s capital markets background, which may be less relevant to a company with less development related financing needs),” according to a J.P. Morgan investor alert.

It’s part of a bigger “management churn” at MPEL, which is reorganizing in a more vertically integrated manner, instead of stovepiping each of its properties. For instance, Altira President Ted Chan is now co-COO, responsible for gaming. He’ll be splitting duties with former City of Dreams (above) consultant Nick Naples, having defected from all-but-defunct Studio City. City of Dreams President Greg Hawkins is out, period, and Melco is going to scour the casino industry for a new CFO. (Gentlemen, please update your resumes.) On the surface, all these moves look like sensible ones, so let’s hope they pan out.

Elsewhere on Macao, the opening date for Venetian Oriental (aka Sites 5 and 6) on the Cotai Strip™ has been pushed back three months, due to a shortage of manpower. The Macanese government is serious about that 1:1 ratio of native vs. imported labor. Las Vegas Sands has only half the 2,600 laborers it needs right now, which doesn’t bode extremely well for a project that will require nearly 11,000 construction workers when work reaches fever pitch. The metaresort’s theme is described as “Polynesian/Himalayan,” which sounds like a hella weird mix. (Will your bags be carried to your room by Sherpa porters?) After the breathtaking design of Marina Bay Sands, it’s disappointing to see Sheldon Adelson™ go all tiki-tacky on us … but maybe that’s what the market wants.