MJCI, Pagcor sign agreement

MANILA, Philippines—Manila Jockey Club Inc. (MJCI), owner of Asia’s oldest racing club, will be putting up off-track betting (OTB) stations in casinos and VIP clubs being operated by Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp. (Pagcor).

This was contained in a memorandum of understanding that MJCI and Pagcor signed recently. The Philippine Racing Club Inc., operator of the Sta. Ana Park in Cavite, also signed the MOU.

According to MJCI executive vice president and chief operating officer Alfonso Reyno III, some of the OTB stations should be up and running by next month, in time for the Presidential Gold Cup, one of the club’s two remaining horse races for the year.

Within 2012, he said all of Pagcor’s 13 casinos and 18 VIP clubs would have OTB stations.

“It is a win-win situation for both sides. Pagcor will get more player traffic in their casinos, while we expand the reach of our OTBs and improve betting access for quality punters,” he said in a statement issued Tuesday.

Apart from the Presidential Gold Cup, the Vice President Binay Alay sa Kawal stakes race would also take place in December, he said.

He said MJCI expected the OTB stations that would be put up in Pagcor venues to be as successful as the one it placed inside the Resorts World compound.

The Resorts World OTB station, he said, was now posting average monthly sales of P4.63 million, about the same as the P4.8 million being generated by MJCI’s highest-grossing OTB stations.

Since the Resorts World OTB station started operating in August, it had climbed from the 30th spot to the fourth spot in terms of sales among all MJCI OTB stations nationwide.

Other high-grossing OTB stations were located at various parts of Manila, Quezon City and Pasay City, he said. It had 263 OTB stations, mostly located within the National Capital Region.

He said MJCI saw horseracing revenues reaching P4 billion this year, slightly higher than the previous year’s P3.9 billion.

Next year, he said revenues should be even higher, as MJCI becomes more aggressive in its rollout of OTB stations all over the country.