Macau’s gaming revenue is likely to rise more than 50 percent in 2010, the territory’s top gaming regulator told the Macau Daily Times yesterday. That represents an increase of over 20 percent from its previous forecast.
Looking at the numbers from January to September, “it is now possible to say that [gaming revenue] will increase more than 50 percent year-on-year,” said the director of the Gaming Inspection and Coordination Bureau (DICJ) Manuel Joaquim das Neves.
Macau’s casino gross gaming revenue reached MOP 15.3 billion (USD 1.9 billion) last month.
It represents a yearly increase of 39.8 percent, according to data released by the gaming regulator early this week. This was the slowest monthly year-on-year growth rate registered so far in 2010.
The total casino gross gaming revenue for the nine months ended September soared 60.1 percent year-on-year to MOP 133.24 billion.
That is more than what the local casinos pocketed overall in 2009 (MOP 119.4 billion). By September 2009, casino gross gaming revenue had only reached MOP 83.2 billion.
As well as the huge increase shown in the first nine months of the year, the first days of October have also been “very positive,” DICJ director said. “We have pulverised daily records for two days in a row [during the Golden Week]. On October 3 the gross gaming revenue set up a new day record, and it beat that on the next day,” Neves told MDT.
However, he added, it is still too soon to predict how much the gaming revenue will grow this month, especially because the increase tends to drop after Golden Week.
Neves had previously said he expected gambling revenue to rise 10 to 15 percent this year, but then he increased his prediction to 30 percent amid a string of new records in monthly gaming revenue.
Casino revenue surged 94.1 percent in May to a record MOP 17 billion (USD 2.1 billion). That followed a 70 percent year-on-year jump in April, when revenue rose to a previous record MOP 14.1 billion.
Up to July, the gaming industry was posting a revenue growth of 67.5 percent. However, last month’s slowdown further cuts this evolution down to 60.1 percent.
The growth of the gaming revenue in the fourth quarter of 2010 could be slower since the comparison basis is higher, as Macau started to show signs of economic recovery from the international financial crisis during the fourth quarter of 2009.
However, with more than 60 percent growth for the first nine months of 2010, “I expect an increase higher than 50 percent for the whole year,” Neves reiterated.
That is in line with expectations of many analysts. Several gaming operators and industry analysts expect the overall growth rate for 2010 to be above 50 percent.
Early this week, financial services firm Morgan Stanley raised its estimate for the local gaming sector’s revenue growth in 2010 to 52 percent.
After September results came out, analyst David Katz, from Jefferies, wrote in a note to investors that the results “are consistent with our view that the revenue trends in Macau should remain robust despite challenging comparisons” in the short term.
Janet Brashear, an analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein & Co., said that Macau growth is “still at attractive levels, even as the rate decelerates.”
Bloomberg quoted independent industry consultant Jonathan Galaviz saying, “Asia’s macro-economic performance continues to be strong and Macau will benefit as long as this dynamic remains.”
In terms of market share, Stanley Ho Hung Sun’s Sociedade de Jogos de Macau keeps ahead of the pack, followed by Sands China and Melco Crown. Galaxy Entertainment appears now in fourth, ahead of Wynn Macau who kept losing market share throughout September. However, it is performing better in the first days of October.
MGM Macau, a joint venture between Pansy Ho and MGM Resorts International, continues in the last position, but now with a bigger market share.
http://www.macaudailytimes.com.mo/macau/...revenue-climb-percent.html |
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