Any visitor to Macau’s casino strip will struggle to avoid David Beckham’s smouldering gaze. The former England football captain is the frontman of a campaign for The Venetian, the city’s biggest hotel and casino resort. Images of him, clad in a James Bond-style dinner jacket, hang all over the city. “Never settle”, reads the slogan.
In a two-minute promotional video for the resort, Mr Beckham arrives at his suite, goes shopping, eats noodles, watches a boxing match, rides a gondola and attends a masquerade ball. He ends by kicking a football at a statue in the hotel lobby, before raising a glass of whisky to a group of adoring bystanders. Just one thing is missing from his itinerary: gambling.
A-listers such as Mr Beckham are the latest recruits for Macau’s casinos, which are struggling to adjust to a slowdown caused by China’s anti-corruption campaign. High-rolling punters have fled Macau in droves , sending sector revenue and casino share prices tumbling in the world’s gambling capital.