A total of 99,000 people that were either Singapore citizens or permanent residents visited the city-state’s two casinos in 2023, a tally representing 3.0 percent of the nation’s adult population at the time, according to the 2023-24 annual report of Singapore’s Gambling Regulatory Authority (GRA), the latest to be published.
The 2023 number was close to the levels seen in Covid-19 pandemic years and in 2019, according to the published statistics of the body and its predecessor the Casino Regulatory Authority.
In the years 2020, 2021 and 2022, those among adult Singapore citizens or permanent residents that went to the two casinos there represented 2.5 percent, 3.0 percent and 3.2 percent respectively of its adult population.
In 2019, a total of 107,000 such people, or 3.4 percent of the city-state’s adult population, visited the casinos there, according to GRA’s past annual reports.
The Singapore casino duopoly is formed by Resorts World Sentosa, run by Genting Singapore Ltd, and Marina Bay Sands, run by a unit of Las Vegas Sands Corp.
Singapore’s Casino Control (Amendment) Act, which was passed on September 10 at a second reading in the country’s parliament, increases from SGD1,000 (US$780.70) to SGD1,500, a maximum fine for any Singapore citizen or permanent resident that enters a casino there without paying the mandatory entry levy. Such persons will also be charged for the amount of entry levy they avoided in the first place.
In a statement issued following the passing of the act, Singapore’s National Council of Problem Gambling had expressed support for the statute and its increased penalties for forms of non-compliance, noting that this contributed to “enhancing deterrence” against persons who contravene gambling safeguards.
The GRA’s chairman Tan Tee How said in the foreword to its latest published report: “Through close collaboration with the National Council on Problem Gambling and the Singapore Police Force, GRA has continued to achieve good outcomes, with both casino crime and problem gambling rates remaining low.”
Specific statistics for the those two indicators were not mentioned in the report.
The report also mentioned the GRA had imposed “the highest amount of financial penalties to-date” in relation specifically to Resorts World Sentosa in December 2023, for the casino operator’s failure to perform “prescribed customer due diligence measures”. The fine amounted to SGD2.25-million.
