As pressure grows on Macau to find new reasons for revenue, scion of casino dynasty imagines some other future for that other SAR
Sabrina Ho Chiu-yeng does what she will to aid Macau diversify. The 26-year-old daughter of Stanley Ho Hung-sun may be more well known for gracing society and entertainment pages, but also in January she organised the first Macau sales by China’s state-owned Poly Auction and then in November held her very own annual hotel art fair, having already launched an exhibit to market the job of young art graduates in September.
“Macau has been evolving,” she tells The Collector. “We don’t want to rely just around the gaming industry. We’d like more families ahead here for holidays, we should boost our cultural and creative industries.”
This is the politically correct view for that daughter of an casino magnate. Macau is within the cross hairs of Beijing’s war on corruption and capital outflow. The central government started urging the location to relinquish its addiction to the gaming sector, the required taxes from where purchase most public expenditures, back during the boom years, if the “build it and they will come” mentality ruled the casino industry. Today, mainland policies to discourage high rollers along with a slowing economy have raised the pressure to find new revenues.
Fundamental change has become slow ahead. Five casinos have opened since 2012 and much more are stored on the way, including two from branches in 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 chiu yeng‘s half-sister Pansy Ho Chiu-king.
So may be Sabrina’s cultural endeavours all just a bit of sentimental pr for that clan?
Well, China’s biggest auction house is treating her seriously, and hopes her youthful energy and family connections will help it get into a brand new and wealthy market where no international house features a presence. In return, Ho says, she wants the auctions to aid attract tourists and maybe encourage the city’s 600,000 residents to formulate a greater portion of an interest in culture. The partnership, called Poly Auction Macau, is 51 per cent belonging to Poly as well as the rest by Ho’s company, Chiu Yeng Culture.
Ho spent my youth flanked by art and also other collectables belonging to her parents but she’s a newcomer on the auctions business. After graduating with an arts degree through the University of Hong Kong, in 2013, she done the branding and marketing side in the family’s hotel and property businesses. “But I love art i asked Poly basically will work in your free time within their Hong Kong office, to learn about the auction world,” she says.
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