{"id":777017192,"date":"2024-07-12T09:39:21","date_gmt":"2024-07-12T12:39:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/?p=777017192"},"modified":"2026-04-22T08:13:40","modified_gmt":"2026-04-22T11:13:40","slug":"morgan-stanley-says-money-exchange-crackdown-could-impact-macau-casino-ebitda","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/morgan-stanley-says-money-exchange-crackdown-could-impact-macau-casino-ebitda","title":{"rendered":"Morgan Stanley says money exchange crackdown could impact Macau casino EBITDA"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Analysts believe EBITDA growth will continue to slow this month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n\n<p>Macau.- Analysts at <strong>Morgan Stanley<\/strong> have indicated that Macau\u2019s gaming sector EBITDA growth is experiencing a slowdown that started in June and will continue this month due to mainland China\u2019s crackdown on money exchange.<strong> Praveen K. Choudhary<\/strong>, <strong>Gareth Leung<\/strong>, and <strong>Stephen W. Grambling <\/strong>say the second quarter saw the first negative quarter-on-quarter growth in mass gross gaming revenue (GGR) and corporate EBITDA since the post-COVID-19 reopening.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Their forecast indicates a<strong> 2 per cent quarter-on-quarter decrease in mass GGR<\/strong> to 113 per cent of the 2019 level. Corporate EBITDA is projected to drop by 7 per cent quarter-on-quarter to 80 per cent of the pre-pandemic level. As such, a 5 per cent half-year over half-year growth is needed in the second half of the year to achieve the full-year 2024 consensus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Last month, China\u2019s Ministry of Public Security called on security forces in Macau and the mainland to enhance cooperation to <a href=\"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/chinese-authorities-plan-crackdown-on-illegal-money-exchange-at-macau-casinos\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">dismantle the network of criminal syndicates<\/a> involved in illicit money exchange.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Macau reported\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/macau-gaming-related-crime-rises-by-122-in-q1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">a 122 per cent increase year-on-year in gambling-related crimes<\/a>\u00a0in the city in the first quarter of the year. Fraud accounted for 21.7 per cent of cases, with 76 instances, followed by loan sharking at 17.9 per cent. Cases involving illegal money exchange were still strongly associated with fraud.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>See also:&nbsp;<\/strong><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/macau-ggr-reaches-us478-8m-in-first-7-days-of-july\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Macau GGR reaches US$478.8m in first 7 days of July<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Analysts believe EBITDA growth will continue to slow this month.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":176,"featured_media":777013253,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"is_press_release":false,"is_interview":false,"is_opinion":false,"focusai_summary":"Macau's gaming sector is experiencing a slowdown in EBITDA growth, attributed by Morgan Stanley analysts to mainland China's intensified crackdown on illicit money exchange. This has led to the first negative quarter-on-quarter growth in mass GGR and corporate EBITDA since the post-COVID reopening, with projections indicating further declines and a need for significant H2 growth to meet 2024 consensus. The regulatory action is also linked to a substantial increase in gambling-related crimes, particularly fraud and illegal money exchange.","focusai_entities":"Morgan Stanley, Praveen K. Choudhary, Gareth Leung, Stephen W. Grambling, China\u2019s Ministry of Public Security","focusai_location":"Macau, China","focusai_target_profile":"ceo_executive (1.0), regulator (0.9), compliance_legal (0.8), operator_casino (1.0), payments_fraud_aml (0.9), investor_analyst (1.0), supplier_vendor (0.7), journalist_researcher (1.0)","focusai_suggestions":[{"label":"H2 Growth Feasibility?","query":"Given the ongoing regulatory crackdown on illicit money exchange, what specific operational adjustments or market shifts are anticipated to enable Macau's gaming sector to achieve the projected 5% H2 over H1 growth required for the full-year 2024 consensus?"},{"label":"Long-term Regulatory Impact?","query":"Beyond the immediate EBITDA slowdown, what are the long-term implications of China's intensified anti-crime initiatives on Macau's gaming governance frameworks, B2B\/B2C licensing structures, and the overall investor confidence in the region?"}],"footnotes":""},"categories":[16338,163],"tags":[23906],"class_list":["post-777017192","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-east-asia-news","category-finance-news","tag-macau-casinos"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/777017192","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/176"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=777017192"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/777017192\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":777017220,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/777017192\/revisions\/777017220"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/777013253"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=777017192"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=777017192"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=777017192"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}