Ten minutes by helicopter or one hour by hydrofoil from Hong Kong, the former Portuguese colony of Macau is crammed onto a couple of tiny islands and a peninsula jutting from the Chinese mainland. Only half the size of Sydney Harbour, it has just overtaken the Las Vegas Strip to become the gaming capital of the world. But the boom has only just begun. Cranes crowd the skyline as new casinos and hotels spring up on reclaimed land. And high-speed ferries stream across the Pearl River estuary from Hong Kong like trucks down a busy freeway.

A new class of hopeful croupiers has just walked through the door of the Lucky Gaming Training Centre in Macau and already they are being put through their paces. Dotted around rows of green baize gaming tables, the new recruits giggle nervously as they try to shuffle and deal the cards under the watchful eye of their instructors. In three months' time these cooks, drivers and shop assistants hope to be employed in one of Macau's many casinos.

First Casino Scheduled to Open on Macau's Cotai Strip Will Use GCA's Full Suite of Services

James Packer's Macau gaming joint venture, Melco PBL Entertainment, has taken on more debt to help fund climbing construction costs for its City of Dreams casino complex on the Cotai strip. The cost of building and designing the project, which includes a casino, shops, three hotels and a block of serviced apartments, has jumped 23 per cent to USD 1.85 billion (AUD 2.2 billion), the company said in a statement to the US Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday.

Las Vegas - Las Vegas Sands Corp. today announced that The Venetian Macao Resort Hotel, Asia's first fully integrated resort and the anchor property of the company's Cotai Strip(TM) development, will open on August 28, 2007. "This is truly a defining moment for Las Vegas Sands Corp. as our work to open Macao's first multi-use integrated resort comes to fruition and our vision of creating "Asia's Las Vegas"(TM) comes one step closer to reality," said Sheldon G. Adelson, chairman and chief executive officer of Las Vegas Sands Corp.

New York (Reuters) - Wynn Resorts Ltd. said on Thursday it plans to slow expansion at its Macau casino amid increasing competition and slowing travel to the Chinese gambling haven. Wynn also said its board of directors approved a program that will allow it to buy back up to USD 1.2 billion in stocks and convertible bonds.

Lai Sun Development Co, a Hong Kong real estate developer, and its media unit have hired Deutsche Bank AG and Morgan Stanley to arrange USD 1.7 billion in loans for a casino project in Macau. The loans will be used to fund development and construction of the hotel, retail and entertainment portions of Macao Studio City, a 3.65 million square-foot project, Lai Sun and ESun Holdings Ltd said in a joint statement to Hong Kong's stock exchange on Friday. The site is located in Macau's Cotai district, the companies said.

Macau confirmed Tuesday it had overtaken the Las Vegas Strip as the world's biggest casino draw, saying it raked in more than seven billion dollars in 2006. The tiny southern Chinese enclave's 22 casinos generated 16.7 billion patacas in the final quarter, taking the year's total gross gaming revenues to 56.2 billion patacas (7.2 billion US dollars).

Macao (Xinhua) -- The Hong Kong-based Galaxy Entertainment Group is to open its mega casino resort in Macao's Cotai island next year, local media reported Tuesday. The Macao Post Daily quoted Francis Lui Yiu-tung, director of the group's gaming concessionaire, as saying that the operation phase of the gaming project will start in the third or fourth quarter of next year.

From elaborate skating shows to big-name pop concerts and haute-cuisine restaurants, Macau's booming casinos are sparking a flood of new business into the southern Chinese territory. But economists warn the gaming sector is flourishing at the expense of other parts of the economy as a labour crunch draws staff from public services like teaching and healthcare into high-paying casino jobs. "There is a structural nightmare awaiting Macau in three to five years unless something is done about the labour situation," said Barry Brewster, director of human resources management firm Evans and Peck.