GGRAsia – Analysts flag likely 2pct m-o-m rise in August Macau GGR

Analysts flag likely 2pct m-o-m rise in August Macau GGR

Aug 02, 2023 Newsdesk Latest News, Macau, Top of the deck

Citigroup says it is “conservatively” forecasting August casino gross gaming revenue (GGR) in Macau at MOP17.0 billion (US$2.12 billion), which would be a 2.0 percent rise on July’s MOP16.66-billion tally, already the best since the advent of the Covid-19 pandemic.

“August is usually a seasonally strong month due to the summer holidays – August was the month with the highest [volume of] inbound tourists in 2019,” stated a Tuesday memo from analysts George Choi and Ryan Cheung.

“That said, we conservatively look for GGR to reach MOP17.0 billion in August… approximately 70 percent of August 2019 level,” added Citigroup. The note observed that would equate to about MOP548 million per day.

“From what we understand, Macau hotels are averaging circa 90 percent occupancy for the weekends over the past couple of weeks, and we believe Macau continues to appeal to the higher-value visitors,” added the Citigroup team.

Carlo Santarelli of Deutsche Bank Securities Inc had a similar view regarding August GGR, citing month-on-month market performance in the years prior to the pandemic.

He stated in a Tuesday note: “Our August forecast of US$2.123 billion is down 30.1 percent versus August of 2019, and represents a monthly sequential per day improvement of 1.8 percent.”

Mr Santarelli added that “compares to the 2.1 percent sequential improvement in August, relative to July, over the period from 2013 to 2019”.

Deutsche Bank’s latest estimate for Macau full-year GGR is the equivalent of US$22.50 billion, i.e., a 326.0 percent improvement year-on-year, and 38.5 percent down on 2019.

Macau’s premium-mass segment GGR probably recovered in July to “100 percent-plus” of pre-pandemic levels, suggested a Tuesday note from JP Morgan Securities (Asia Pacific) Ltd.