World Pool bets boost both SA and Hong Kong

Racing operators in South Africa will be very pleased to hear that the Hong Kong Jockey Club’s World Pool initiative has been a big success – with betting turnover increasing by a weighty 57.1% in the 2023/24 season that ended at the weekend.

Without that cash injection from global comingled pools from elite racing events around the world – including South Africa in terms of both wagering input and product – Hong Kong racing would have suffered a bigger loss than the 4.5% decline it has just reported.

The HKJC’s overall betting turnover was HK$134.7 billion (about R311.6 billion) – a slight drop after three straight years of record turnovers. HKJC chief executive Winifried Engelbrecht-Bresges described the financial results as “satisfactory” but revealed a new strategy to increase field sizes and to “re-engage” with fans on the racing-mad enclave.

World Pool programme

One thing that won’t change much is the burgeoning World Pool programme that takes in prominent races and whole race meetings the likes of Royal Ascot, the Melbourne Cup and next weekend’s Gold Cup Day at Greyville in Durban.

The latter not only provides racing and television pictures to a global audience, it also gets significant financial backing from the Hong Kong connection. The Gold Cup itself, the country’s premier endurance race, has HKJC as its title sponsor, while the main supporting feature, the Champions Cup, carries the World Pool banner.

Hong Kong’s final meeting of the season, at Sha Tin racecourse on Sunday, saw a thrilling duel for the trainer championship, with veteran handler Francis Lui winning four of the final five races on the card to pip rival Pierre Ng by just one victory.

The only South African trainer still operating in Hong Kong, former champion jockey Douglas Whyte, finished in 11th place among the two dozen or so licenced conditioners.

Australian Zac Purton won the jockey championship for the seventh time, registering 130 wins from 680 rides, at a win ratio of 19.1%. South African-trained Mauritian Karis Teetan was runner-up with 86 wins.

Former South African champion jockeys Lyle Hewitson and Keagan de Melo were eighth and 16th respectively on the log, with former local champion apprentice Luke Ferraris in 12th.

Changes after Covid

Sunday’s season finale at Sha Tin attracted a strong crowd of 30,755. But this paled alongside the biggest moment of the season, the Lunar New Year meeting in February, which saw the biggest post-pandemic crowd of 81,049 descend on Sha Tin and punters wager HK$1.74 billion.

New Year is seen as a highly propitious time in Chinese culture. In 2024 it heralded a year of the dragon, while most of 2025 will be a year of the snake.

Engelbrecht-Bresges said several challenges led to the slight turnover decline, including the economic downturn that affected many racing jurisdictions around the world.

“If you look at the global horse racing scene, besides Japan, it is under significant challenges due to the economy and there is a complete change in consumer behaviour,” he said.

“We see this in Hong Kong even more, with people spending differently after Covid. So, we have to reinvent what we do. Japan has done a fantastic job, but I personally think we have to be different to Japan. We can focus on the entertainment element more and our strategy is to really focus on mainland Chinese people coming here.

“If you look at turnover and gross margin, you have to look at field sizes because, this year, we were definitely not at optimum field sizes… We have a strategy to fix the horse population issue and we will see field sizes grow. I’m convinced we will come out of these economic challenges stronger with our long-term vision.”

The HKJC is yet to release next term’s fixture list, but the 2024-25 season is expected to kick off on September 8.