http://www.smh.com.au/business/james-packers-crown-resorts-signs-...

http://www.smh.com.au/business/jame...n-final-queens-wharf-bid-20150709-gi8djd.html

James Packer's Crown Resorts has signed off on its $2 billion-plus bid for Queen's Wharf in Brisbane, as Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk confirmed the winning bidder would be announced after the state budget on July 14.

Crown, which is vying with arch rival Echo Entertainment for the rights to develop Queen's Wharf, held a board meeting on Monday, where it finalised its proposal to the Queensland government.
The meeting, held by conference call, is thought to have approved an increased financial offering from Crown to the government, along with a buyback of poker machines from pubs and clubs in the state to work inside the cap on machines in Queensland. Mr Packer is the chairman and half-owner of Crown Resorts.

While final bids from Crown and Echo have been submitted to the Queensland government, both companies are understood to have tinkered with aspects of their offers in the past few days before an official decision in the coming weeks.

On Thursday Ms Palaszczuk shrugged off pressure from opposition leader Lawrence Springborg to speed up the decision and said the government would name the winning consortium after the state budget on July 14.

"As I have said previously, we are expecting an announcement on that [Queen's Wharf] before the end of this month. It is still a work in progress," she said.

"I don't expect the announcement to be made before the budget. There are still ongoing discussions."
Stalling unnecessarily

Earlier on Thursday Mr Springborg called on Ms Palaszczuk to announce the successful bid, saying the Liberal National Party had laid the groundwork for the development and Labor was stalling unnecessarily on naming a winner.

"The LNP had the Queen's Wharf project set in concrete, Labor just needs to announce who will pour it," Mr Springborg said. "It is time for Labor to get on with this announcement and not simply delay it to try and gain some glory at a time when everyone knows there will be no good news for the people of this state."

Crown has partnered with Chinese state-owned developer Greenland Holdings for its bid, while Echo created a joint venture with Hong Kong-based Far East Consortium and Chinese conglomerate Chow Tai Fook to build the proposed casino, hotel and residential project.

Brisbane has become a fierce battleground for the gaming adversaries, after Crown trumped Echo by winning the rights for a second Sydney casino licence at Barangaroo in 2013. That means Echo, from 2019, will lose its position as the incumbent monopoly casino licence holder in NSW.

Echo is widely considered the frontrunner to win the Queen's Wharf bid, given it holds Brisbane's only existing casino licence, for Treasury Casino.

Deutsche estimates Echo has a 75 per cent chance of winning the tender, with the owner of Sydney's Star Casino potentially paying up to $750 million for the development. Credit Suisse has estimated the development cost of the site could hit $2 billion, meaning Echo could need to spend more than $1 billion from 2017.

CLSA said it expected Echo to win the contest, noting Queensland pubs and clubs supported its bid, given a Crown win would result in 1500 new rival poker machines opening in the state.