Deutsche Bank: Macau’s GGR to reach US$1.80bn in Q4

Carlo Santarelli, an analyst at Deutsche Bank Securities Inc, predicts GGR will pick from the last quarter.

Macau.- Carlo Santarelli, an analyst at Deutsche Bank Securities, has predicted that Macau’s GGR will come in at MOP14.6bn (US$1.8bn) in the fourth quarter of the year. That would be a drop of 24.8 per cent year-on-year, but a much lower decline than the 53.1 per cent year-on-year drop reported for the year so far.

According to Deutsche, mass-market gross gaming revenue for the fourth quarter is expected to be around MOP11.6bn (US$1.43m), down 19.5 per cent year on year. VIP gaming revenue is forecast at about MOP3bn (US$368m), down 40 per cent year on year.

If the forecast proves accurate, it would be a similar decline to in the first three months of the year.

According to authorities, in the first 9 months of the year, combined gross gaming revenue (GGR) stands at MOP31.82bn. In the third quarter, GGR was just MOP5.612m (US$695m) due to the latest Covid-19 outbreak.

Colin Mansfield, sector head for US gaming, lodging and leisure at Fitch Ratings, has said he expects Macau to remain the largest gaming market in the world and not to lose material share to other Asia Pacific thanks to the competitive advantages of proximity to mainland China and its size, with more than 40 casinos.

He told Macau Business: “Forecasting Macau is extremely challenging because we just don’t know when the demand will snap back, as it is mainly dependent on visitation […] we’re modelling gross gaming revenue to be about 70 per cent of 2019 levels by 2024, and 90 per cent by 2025. Obviously quite conservative but it’s very difficult to predict when visitation will snap back.”