Century Casinos has $50m to spend in Asia: Union Gaming

Thursday 5th of April 2018

Century Casinos, a Nasdaq-listed operator with operations in the U.S., Canada and Europe, has more than $50 million in available capital to put towards a potential project in Asia, Union Gaming analyst John DeCree said in a note.

An investment of this level would be possible “without pushing net leverage beyond 2.0x, which could represent a decent-sized opportunity in a secondary or tertiary market in Asia, he wrote.

The company has said it’s close to announcing an “exciting growth project” this year and analysts expect the opportunity to be in Asia, where it has no land-based presence.

“We would expect CNTY to enter Asia with a local partner, utilizing a joint-venture structure to both derisk the overall investment from a capital perspective and to mitigate some of the local regulatory risks and hurdles,” DeCree notes. “Ultimately, Century Mile is still top priority, but the company has sufficient balance sheet capacity to pursue other opportunities as well. The company is already geographically diverse, between Canada, USA, and Poland, so we see little concern about expanding into Asia.”

Union Gaming forecasts 65 percent in adjusted EBITDA growth for the company between 2017 and 2019, driven by key projects in the pipeline. These include new casinos in Poland, the Saw Close Casino in the U.K. and the Century Mile in Canada.

The company has a presence in China through a casino on board the cruise ship Glory Sea, which caters to VIP players. The cruise ship is operated by Diamond Cruise International Co Ltd, a subsidiary of mainland Chinese travel company Suzhou Taihu International Travel Agency.

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