Russian buyer of Tigre de Cristal ends deal: Summit Ascent

Feb 23, 2024 Newsdesk Latest News, Rest of Asia, Top of the deck  

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Hong Kong-listed Summit Ascent Holdings Ltd says that the previously-announced sale of its Tigre de Cristal casino operations to a Russian firm has been terminated at the request of the would-be buyer.

In a joint announcement issued on Thursday with parent LET Group Ltd, the firm said it was served on Monday with a “notice of unilateral extrajudicial repudiation”, i.e., “withdrawal from execution” of the agreement by Russian entity Dalnevostochniy Aktiv LLC. The document sought to “effect a termination” of the sale, the Summit-LET statement said.

The deal, first made public on January 10, was to involve the disposal by an entity called Oriental Regent Ltd, of 100 percent of the shares in its wholly-owned G1 Entertainment LLC to the Aktiv entity for a consideration of US$116 million, to be paid in Chinese yuan.

Oriental Regent is company through which Summit Ascent runs gaming and hotel operations at the Tigre de Cristal casino resort (pictured) near Vladivostok in Russia.

G1 Entertainment holds a gaming licence for Tigre de Cristal, granted by the Russian government.

Summit Ascent owns 77.5 percent of Oriental Regent, according to its latest interim report. Trading in Summit Ascent and LET Group’s shares in Hong Kong has been halted since mid-last month.

Taiwan firm Firich Enterprises Co Ltd, via its unit Firich Investment Ltd, has stated it holds a 20-percent stake in Oriental Regent.

LET Group and Summit Ascent “will be seeking legal advice on the termination notice and will make appropriate announcement if and when appropriate, including amongst others, announcement on the application for resumption of trading in shares,” the joint announcement said.

Following the news on the sale of the Tigre de Cristal operations, a total of all but one of the Summit Ascent’s six directors had resigned. The reason given was their “disapproval” of the deal. As per the latest available information, only regional casino investor Andrew Lo Kai Bong is a director, as well as chairman, of Summit Ascent.

Mr Lo is also chairman and a director of LET Group. The latter firm also confirmed in its own filing on January 15 that all its board members other than Mr Lo had resigned due to disapproval of the sale of the Tigre de Cristal licensee.

In an August filing to the Hong Kong bourse, Summit Ascent said it had swung to a loss of HKD16.1-million (US$2.1-million) in the first half to June 30, compared to a HKD85.2-million profit in the prior-year period.

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