Sci Games sues HK firm to get investor disclosure: report

Jun 17, 2019 Newsdesk Latest News, Top of the deck, World  

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Gaming equipment and lottery services provider Scientific Games Corp has filed a lawsuit in Nevada, in the United States, in an effort to make one of its largest individual shareholders – described as a Hong Kong-based firm – provide information relevant to suitability considerations by the state’s gaming regulator.

That is according to a story in specialist media outlet CDC Gaming Reports carrying a Saturday dateline.

It said Scientific Games had filed the lawsuit on Friday in Clark County District Court in Las Vegas against an entity the report referred to as Sylebra Holdings.

CDC Gaming Reports added that Scientific Games mentioned in its lawsuit Sylebra Holdings was being investigated by a number of gaming regulators in the U.S. and elsewhere, namely regarding its possible links with a Russia-based third party.

According to information on Nasdaq’s website – citing the most recently available 13F filings reporting long positions by investment managers with at least US$100 million under management – an entity called Sylebra HK Co Ltd is among the top-five institutional investors in Scientific Games, with just over 8.6 million shares.

CDC Gaming Reports said this represented a 9.34 percent stake in Scientific Games. The outlet added that under laws and regulations applying to gaming in Nevada, any investor holding 10 percent or more of a licensed gaming company was itself subject to licensing or a finding of suitability by the Nevada Gaming Control Board.

The media outlet quoted a statement from Susan Cartwright, a spokesperson for Scientific Games, saying Sylebra “has refused to supply” basic information about the investment fund’s own investors for more than two years.

She was further quoted by CDC Gaming Reports as saying: “Scientific Games has now filed a lawsuit against Sylebra in Nevada state court asking for a ruling that Sylebra be required to provide us with the information we need to maintain the integrity and transparency our regulators expect and require of us.”

In January Bloomberg reported that an entity referred to as Sylebra Capital Management had a US$1.2-billion hedge fund based in Hong Kong and that it focused on technology investments.

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