The number of visitors arriving in Macau fell 7.6 percent year-on-year in November, said the city’s Statistics and Census Service in a statement on Monday.
November’s tally of 2,589,451 was also down 1.8 percent month-on-month.
Macau’s casino gross gaming revenue (GGR) for November fell by 32.3 percent year-on-year to approximately MOP16.43 billion (US$2.06 billion), according to official data released on December 1.
Mainland China accounted for 1,726,859 of arrivals to Macau in November, nearly 67 percent of all arrivals. That component of arrivals was nonetheless down 12.6 percent year-on-year.
Those visitors from the mainland travelling under China’s exit visa system known as the Individual Visit Scheme – described by investment analysts as generally the tourist segment most valuable to casino resorts in Macau due to their higher spending power compared to package tour visitors – dropped by 17.6 percent year-on-year in November, to 774,661 arrivals.
The November 2015 visitor data show that the number of same day visitors to the city that month was 1,344,381 (51.9 percent of total arrivals), down by 14.0 percent year-on-year. The tally of overnight visitors in November rose marginally to 1,245,070.
In the first 11 months of 2015, visitor arrivals to the city totalled 28,080,530, down by 3.1 percent year-on-year. Same-day visitors (15,103,046) and overnight visitors (12,977,484) for the period decreased by 3.1 percent and 3.2 percent year-on-year respectively.
Macau’s accumulated casino GGR for the first 11 months of the year fell 35.3 percent compared to the same period in 2014.
The average stay of same day visitors (0.2 of a day) remained unchanged in November while that of overnight visitors (2.1 days) rose by 0.2 of a day in year-on-year terms.
In November, visitors from mainland China came primarily from Guangdong province (772,547 arrivals), Hunan province (70,797) and Fujian province (67,911).
Arrivals from Hong Kong (512,537), South Korea (46,071), Japan (27,217) and Taiwan (84,697) increased by 0.9 percent, 10.8 percent, 8.8 percent and 21.6 percent respectively year-on-year.
The number of long haul visitors from the United States (18,619), Australia (8,519) and Canada (7,683) registered year-on-year increases, while the tally of visitors from the United Kingdom (6,210) decreased.
