An “economic slowdown” was cited as a key factor in the 14.9-percent decline in gaming sector suspicious transaction reports (STRs) filed in the first half of 2025.
That is according to the Financial Intelligence Office – a unit of Macau’s Unitary Police Service – in an emailed reply to GGRAsia’s enquiry.
The Macau gaming sector filed an aggregate of 1,856 STRs in the first six months of this year. That compared with 2,181 STRs the sector filed in the prior-year period.
“The decrease in the number of STRs in gaming sector was mainly due to the economic slowdown,” stated the Financial Intelligence Office.
“The STRs reported by the gaming sector involved different types of gaming activities such as chips conversion without or with minimal gaming activities, chips conversion on behalf of third parties, etc,” observed the office.
It added: “These common typologies of the STRs reported from the gaming sector are basically the same throughout 2019 to the first half of 2025, but in slightly different orders in terms of occurrences.”
In 2024, the gaming sector filed 3,837 STRs, marking the most for a 12-month period since record-keeping by the office began in 2006.
