down yesterday after a sell-down in Hong Kong where more than a third of its value was wiped on Thursday.
The other concern is the substantial amount of shares that Kok Thay has pledged. It has been reported that almost all of Kok Thay’s 76% stake or 6 billion shares in Genting Hong Kong is now committed – up from 5.5 billion shares he pledged in April.Apart from this, according to a research report, Kok Thay’s family has also pledged 32% of its block of shares in Genting in exchange for facilities for Genting Hong Kong.
“The cruise business is definitely harder hit because of the huge overhead expenses and fixed costs and at the same time operators still can’t operate. At a time when these Genting companies need to conserve cash to ride out the pandemic, any proposal that will stretch their financial resources will not sit well with investors.
Genting Singapore, which has the largest cash hoard, has committed S$4.5bil for the Resorts World Sentosa expansion. Genting Malaysia, meanwhile, is constructing an outdoor theme park, costing RM5bil, while parent Genting needs to spend another US$2.2bil in the next one year to see the completion of its integrated resort, casino and MICE centre in Las Vegas.