Macau relies on VIP sector

Macau casino revenue recovers from a two-year crisis and starts to grow thanks to the VIP sector.

Macau.- Financial reports in Macau have been boosted by VIP casino operations since the beginning of the year. Local authorities have confirmed that the gross gaming revenue in the gaming hub reached €1.7 billion during the first three weeks of January 2018 – an increase of around 21 percent year-on-year.

Meanwhile, Macau casinos’ ADR was set at €86.7 million in the same period. “January GGR is likely to reach €2.4 billion, an estimated increase of 26-27 percent year-on-year”, published brokerage company Sanford C. Bernstein Ltd. yesterday. The estimated result was calculated assuming a gross gaming revenue ADR of around MOP 740-760 million (€7.9 million approximately) for the rest of the month.

“Assuming a GGR average daily rate of €74.3 to 76.3 million for the remaining days of the month, we estimate January’s GGR to a range of € 2.37 and 2.4 billion, an estimated year-on-year increase in January of 22 to 24 per cent, which is higher than our previous estimates,” stated analysts Vitaly Umansky, Zhen Gong and Cathy Huang.

According to Bernstein experts, VIP volume so far “was likely up by a high single-digit percentage rate month-on-month… and back to November’s level, and mass was likely flat month-on-month.”