GGRAsia – Casino op Bloomberry gets extra US$400mln loan facility

Casino op Bloomberry gets extra US$400mln loan facility

Dec 23, 2020 Newsdesk Latest News, Philippines, Top of the deck

Two units of Philippine group Bloomberry Resorts Corp, an operator and developer of casino complexes, have negotiated with banks an additional loan facility amounting to PHP20 billion (US$416 million), to add to PHP73.5 billion the group had arranged previously.

“The additional funding, if drawn, will be used to support the cash flow requirements of Solaire Resort and Casino [pictured], partially finance capital expenditures for the improvement and refurbishment of existing facilities at Solaire, and partially finance Bloomberry Resorts and Hotels Inc’s working capital requirements and other general corporate purposes,” said the parent group in a Tuesday filing.

Bloomberry Resorts’ flagship is Solaire Resort and Casino in Entertainment City. Bloomberry Resorts and Hotels Inc and Sureste Properties Inc were the two Bloomberry units negotiating the fresh loan facility for the group.

For the first nine months of 2020, amid the Covid-19 pandemic, the Bloomberry parent reported a net loss of nearly PHP5.86 billion, compared with net income of PHP8.59 billion in the prior-year period.

Bloomberry is developing another gaming resort – known as Solaire North – at Quezon City on the outskirts of the Metro Manila area. Because of countermeasures against Covid-19 in the Philippines, the expected completion date on that property is the end of 2022 or early 2023, the group has said.

The parent added in its Tuesday filing to the Philippine Stock Exchange that the group’s pitch for fresh loan resources was “oversubscribed” among the lenders.

Bloomberry Resorts’ bankers also granted deferment of covenant testing for the existing term loan facilities, for the quarterly periods covering September 30, 2020 to June 30, 2023, said the parent.

The syndicate of banks participating in the additional facility is: BDO Unibank, Inc; China Banking Corp; Philippine National Bank; Robinsons Bank Corporation; and United Coconut Planters Bank. They were all participants in the initial PHP73.5 billion loan facility.

An extensive lockdown for Metro Manila, including for the capital’s large-scale casino resorts in Entertainment City, was first announced in mid-March as part of Covid-19 countermeasures, and was subsequently extended over time and in increments, although the terms were later relaxed somewhat.

In late August, the nation’s casino regulator, the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp, known as Pagcor, confirmed to GGRAsia that some casino resorts in that country had been allowed to reopen, “limited to a maximum of 30 percent capacity” and with strict health countermeasures against Covid-19.

In early November, Bloomberry Resorts reported a third-quarter net loss of PHP2.54 billion, an improvement from the PHP4.70-billion loss in the preceding quarter as revenue rose sequentially.

As of Saturday, it was reported by local news outlet Rappler that Metro Manila was due to remain under so-called general community quarantine, or “GCQ”, until the end of the year. That was according to comments attributed to Delfin Lorenzana, the country’s Defense Secretary.