Okada Manila nearly doubles revenues in Aug

MANILA, Philippines — Okada Manila continues to see an increase in gaming and non-gaming revenues.

In a notice to shareholders, Universal Entertainment Corp. said Tiger Resort Leisure & Entertainment Inc.’s (TRLEI) revenues almost doubled to P4 billion from P2.3 billion a year ago.

Gross gaming revenue amounted to P3.8 billion in August, up 71 percent year-on-year.

On a month-on-month basis, the August figure also showed an improvement from the P3.3 billion revenue recorded in July.

Of the P3.8 billion, revenue from VIP table games reached P1.9 billion compared to P790 million a year ago while revenue from mass table games increased to P917 million from P718 million a year ago.

Gaming machine revenue grew to P984 million from P735 million a year ago.

Other revenue rose P225 million  from P137 million a year ago.

“The increase in gross gaming revenue is due to increased mass market volumes and high VIP win rate. On year-on-year comparison, total revenue increased by 72 percent or P1.7 million and adjusted segment EBITDA increased 254 percent or  P541 million,” it said.

TRLEI has been improving operations following recent leadership changes particularly the ouster of former chairman Kazuo Okada.

It also plans to change the name of its integrated casino resort.

Early this year, TRLEI’s parent company Tiger Resort Asia Ltd. (TRAL) completed the acquisition of the majority of shares of Asiabest Group International Inc. (ABG).

The Hong Kong-based TRAL completed the acquisition of 66.6 percent of the listed shares of ABG, paving the way for the backdoor listing of TRLEI. TRAL now owns 200 million shares of ABG.

“In light of these developments, Okada Manila has begun considering changing its brand name. With the move of potentially changing its brand name, TRLEI, can now fully focus on refining its operations and further achieving stellar growth on a clean, untarnished slate,” Okada Manila said in a previous announcement from Japan.

Okada Manila was named after its founder Kazuo Okada. However, the embattled pachinko king lost control of his companies after his children turned against him in 2017 because of allegations of fraud.