Macau expects between up to 8 million visitors in 2021

Macau authorities believe an outbreak of Covid-19 cases in Guangdong province may have affected Macau’s recovery and visitor arrivals.

Macau.- According to the Macau Government Tourism Office (MGTO) the city could receive between 7 and 8 million visitors this year. That compares to previous forecasts of between 6 and 10 million arrivals.

The new predictions come after Macau’s GGR fell 24 per cent in the third week of June when compared to the previous week.

Macao Government Tourism Office director Maria Helena de Senna Fernandes said a rise in Covid-19 cases in the province of Guangdong had caused a negative impact on Macau’s visitor arrivals for June.

During the first five months of the year, Macau had nearly 3.4 million visitors, up 4.7 per cent year-on-year. In May, the city received 866,000 visitors, with 165,500 during the Labour Day break.

Despite being a good performance, numbers were a long way from 2019 levels, when Macau registered 531,000 visitors arrivals during what was a four-day break in 2019 (this year the Labour Day break was extended).

For now, mainland China is the only country to have a largely quarantine-free travel bubble with Macau. 

Plans to launch a travel bubble between Hong Kong and Macau have been halted again after a case of the Delta variant of Covid-19 was detected in Hong Kong, which means Hong Kong won’t reach the 28 days without a local Covid-19 case that Macau set as a condition for travel bubble.

According to Bernstein Research, Macau’s gross gaming revenue (GGR) could reach MOP10.72bn in June – 45 per cent of pre-pandemic levels.