As pressure grows on Macau to get new reasons for revenue, scion of casino dynasty imagines some other future for the other SAR
Sabrina Ho Chiu-yeng does what she will to help Macau diversify. The 26-year-old daughter of Stanley Ho Hung-sun could possibly be more well known for gracing society and entertainment pages, but also in January she organised the very first Macau sales by China’s state-owned Poly Auction and then in November held her annual hotel art fair, having already launched an exhibition to promote the work of young art graduates in September.
“Macau has been evolving,” she tells The Collector. “We don’t desire to rely just about the gaming industry. We would like more families ahead in charge of holidays, we want to boost our cultural and artistic industries.”
This is a politically correct view for the daughter of a casino magnate. Macau is in the cross hairs of Beijing’s war on corruption and capital outflow. The central government started urging town to give up its addiction to the gaming sector, the taxes where buy most public expenditures, back throughout the boom years, in the event the “build it and they will come” mentality ruled the casino industry. Today, mainland policies to discourage high rollers combined with a slowing economy have increased pressure to succeed to get new revenues.
Fundamental change continues to be slow ahead. Five casinos have opened since 2012 and much more take presctiption the way, including two from branches from the Ho empire – the Grand Lisboa Palace, led by Ho’s mother, Angela Leong On-kei (Stanley’s so-called “fourth wife”), and MGM Cotai, headed by Sabrina ho‘s half-sister Pansy Ho Chiu-king.
So can be Sabrina’s cultural endeavours all slightly of soppy public relations for the clan?
Well, China’s biggest ah is treating her seriously, and hopes her youthful energy and family connections might help it enter a new and wealthy market where no international house has a presence. In turn, Ho says, she would like the auctions to help attract tourists and maybe encourage the city’s 600,000 residents to develop really an interest in culture. The partnership, called Poly Auction Macau, is 51 percent owned by Poly and the rest by Ho’s company, Chiu Yeng Culture.
Ho spent my childhood years flanked by art and other collectables owned by her parents but she’s new to angling towards the auctions business. After graduating having an arts degree from the University of Hong Kong, in 2013, she done the branding and marketing side from the family’s hotel and property businesses. “But I like art i asked Poly basically could work part time in their Hong Kong office, to discover the auction world,” she says.
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