Imperial Pacific seeks new deadline on Saipan: report

May 15, 2019 Newsdesk Latest News, Top of the deck, World  

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A unit of Imperial Pacific International Holdings Ltd has reportedly asked the gaming regulator on Saipan to extend again a completion deadline on a portion of its under-construction casino resort (pictured in a file photo).

The new deadline requested was August 21, 2022, versus what was reported as a “current” deadline of February 28, 2021. The issue was not discussed during a Tuesday meeting of the Commonwealth Casino Commission on Saipan, said the Marianas Variety newspaper.

A separate request from the resort promoter, Imperial Pacific International LLC, was approved by the regulator, according to the news outlet and a separate report in the Saipan Tribune newspaper. This was for hotel rooms that might be built by future Imperial Pacific partners or investors to go toward a 2,000-room count requirement for its development. The tally of rooms is said to be mandated by the local casino law.

The casino regulator on Saipan, a United States jurisdiction that is part of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, a Pacific Ocean territory – issued in August last year a February 2021 deadline, for what was termed the initial phase of the resort. That was itself an amendment from a previously-announced deadline.

In a brief announcement to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange in late April, Imperial Pacific International Holdings said a portion – i.e., “phase one” – of its project, which it referred to as “Imperial Palace Saipan” would “partially” open “on or before” the end of the third quarter of this year. The firm has previously referred to “Imperial Pacific Resort”, when talking about its Saipan scheme as a whole.

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