Macau gambling founder and head of SJM Holdings Stanley Ho has died at the age of 98. This was reported by the Chinese newspaper South China Morning Post. He died in a hospital in Hong Kong.

Stanley Ho is credited with making Macau the new gambling capital of the world. He entered the gambling business in the 1960s and until 1999 had exclusive rights to build a casino in Macau. The businessman was repeatedly accused of organizing criminal schemes for money laundering and having links with the mafia. Ho did not deny the accusations, but stated that any casino owner in the 1980s and 90s could be convicted of this.

As of 2020, SJM Holdings remains the largest gambling company in Asia, with 20 casinos under its control in Macau alone. Largely thanks to the efforts of Stanley Ho, the gambling zone in Macau overtook Las Vegas in terms of financial performance in the mid-2000s. The businessman, whose net worth was estimated at $6 billion, was the head of SJM Holdings until 2018 and retired on the eve of his 97th birthday.