Macau’s casino gross gaming revenue (GGR) for the first 17 days of December is estimated at MOP9 billion (US$1.12 billion), or circa MOP529 million a day, said JP Morgan Securities (Asia Pacific) Ltd in a Monday memo, citing its industry checks.
Last week’s casino GGR was estimated to have reached MOP542 million a day, up from MOP520 million a day in the previous week, suggested JP Morgan analysts DS Kim, Mufan Shi and Selina Li.
The latest December Macau GGR data indicate the city’s mass GGR was “running at around 100 percent” of pre-Covid 19 level, while VIP GGR was at “mid- or high-teens” of pre-Covid level due to “poor luck”, for the operators, the JP Morgan team suggested.
The analysts forecast estimate full-December GGR will reach circa MOP17 billion, or an average daily run rate of about MOP550 million, as the city’s gaming revenue was expected to “edge up further” in the remaining days of the month, into the year-end holidays.
They noted in the memo: “This would also imply fourth-quarter GGR to grow by 8 percent quarter-on-quarter (with mass being a tad stronger, say 9 percent quarter-on-quarter), which in turn could drive 8 percent to 10 percent quarter-on-quarter growth in industry EBITDA [earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation] versus historical seasonality of 5 percent growth quarter-on-quarter before Covid-19.”
Macau’s third-quarter GGR stood at MOP48.81 billion, up 7.3 percent from the previous quarter, according to official data. Out of that third-quarter city-wide GGR tally, nearly 61 percent – or MOP29.77 billion – was generated from mass-market baccarat play.
