Amid conflicting statements made by Ho and his family, his lawyer Gordon Oldham filed the writ late yesterday in Hong Kong’s High Court. While the 89-year-old Ho announced on television that he no longer needed Oldham’s services, the lawyer says he still represents the tycoon and the writ appears to carry Ho’s signature.
Claim and counter-claim over the transfer of Ho’s 31.7 percent stake in Sociedade de Turismo e Diversoes de Macau SA has driven down the shares of SJM Holdings Ltd. by 7.4 percent this week. SJM, built by Ho over 5 decades into Asia’s biggest gambling company, runs most casinos in the Chinese city of Macau, where gambling revenue is four times that of the Las Vegas Strip.
“This story continues to unfold in a dynamic way and it will continue to make the public shareholder base of SJM uncomfortable because of the possible strategic impacts of this volatility,” said independent industry consultant Jonathan Galaviz.
SJM shares rose 1.5 percent to HK$13.32 as of 11:14 am today after falling almost 5 percent yesterday.
Ho built his fortune after Macau’s colonial government in 1962 granted him and his partners a gambling monopoly. While that ended in 2004 with the entry of operators including Sheldon Adelson’s Las Vegas Sands Corp., Ho was ranked Hong Kong’s 13th- richest man, with a net worth of $3.1 billion, by Forbes magazine this month.
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