Star Entertainment, the beleaguered Australian owner and operator of land-based casinos, has announced that it raised 800 million Australian dollars in equity in order to balance the books after the loss recorded in the first half of the 2022-2023 fiscal year.
The company lost over 1 billion dollars during the first half of the fiscal year, mainly because of a non-cash impairment of the group’s Sydney assets worth no less than 988 million Australian dollars, resulting from costs and penalties associated with the company’s regulatory difficulties.
In 2022, an inquiry requested by the government of New South Wales into the company’s anti-money laundering and safe gambling procedures found that Star Entertainment was unsuitable to hold a casino license in the state.
The company did continue to operate its casino in Sydney but had to undergo a transformation that cost a lot of money, attempting to change the operations in order to prevent the license being canceled altogether.
Speaking about the company’s difficulties, Robbie Cooke, the Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director of Star Entertainment underlined the fact that the operator’s top priority is to regain the trust of the public and of the government authorities.
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“Our focus has been and remains on working constructively with our regulators and the NSW manager and Queensland special manager to urgently remediate our businesses as we seek to return to suitability,” Robbie Cooke said.
