Macau casino gross gaming revenue (GGR) for the first 11 days of January was MOP8.05 billion (US$1.00 billion), or MOP731 million a day, according to a Monday memo from JP Morgan, citing its own research.
The trend should “ease investors’ concerns” about signs of a gaming demand slowdown at the end of last year, when average daily GGR was MOP620 million to MOP630 million, added the institution.
Citing industry “checks” as the source, the brokerage suggested Macau’s GGR last week was MOP692 million a day, following a “long weekend” at MOP800 million a day over the new calendar year.
The ‘long weekend’ referred to the first three days of January – a Thursday to Saturday – on official holiday on the Chinese mainland, as designated by China’s State Council. In 2025 China’s official holiday for calendar new year was only January 1.
Macau’s GGR performance has shown a “steady” trend so far this month, suggested JP Morgan.
Analysts DS Kim, Selina Li, and Lindsey Qian wrote: “This should hopefully ease investor concerns about a demand slowdown at the end of last year (to MOP620 million to MOP630 million per day), which was dragged down by (very) poor VIP luck and seasonality ahead of the long new-year weekend.”
The team forecast Macau’s January GGR to grow by “at least” 15 percent year-on-year, which in turn could drive the city’s first-quarter GGR to circa 13 percent expansion.
For full-year 2026, JP Morgan forecasts Macau GGR to expand by 5 percent to 6 percent, led by anticipated mass-table and slot-machine growth rates of 7 percent to 8 percent. But the institution thinks the VIP segment might see GGR decline 5 percent year-on-year in 2026, due to a “high” base luck-wise, in 2025.
The analysts also suggested the Macau gaming sector’s profit growth in 2026 could track 6 percent to 7 percent year-on-year, moderately outpacing the brokerage’s full-year GGR expansion forecast.
Should they be realised, such growth figures would help in “repairing the 2025 flow-through gap when [Macau] industry EBITDA [earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation] only rose 6 percent despite GGR grew by 9 percent,” suggested JP Morgan.
Its analysts added: “In other words, even with a likely moderating GGR, we see profit momentum sustaining, if not accelerating, in 2026.”
