Inward foreign direct investment (FDI) to Macau’s gaming sector fell 55.3 percent year-on-year in 2014, show official data published on Tuesday.
Information from the city’s Statistics and Census Service indicated that overall flows of inward FDI to Macau amounted to MOP26.32 billion (US$3.30 billion) in 2014, down 27.2 percent from 2013. The bureau said FDI inflows dropped as “reinvested earnings were reduced by dividend distributions of some enterprises”.
Foreign investment in Macau’s gaming sector fell at a faster pace than overall FDI, to MOP12.44 billion last year, compared to MOP27.81 billion in 2013.
The gaming sector accounted for 47.3 percent of the total inward FDI in 2014, a sharp decline from the 76.9-percent share recorded in the previous year, according to the statistics bureau.
The banking and finance sector was a distant second, with a share of 18.7 percent. FDI inflows to the wholesale and retail industry in 2014 increased by 165.4 percent year-on-year to MOP3.58 billion, while inward FDI to cultural, recreational and other services reached MOP3.67 billion, a jump of 309.5 percent from the prior year.
Market-wide inward FDI income totalled MOP84.95 billion in 2014, up by 7.5 percent year-on-year. “Inward direct investment income earned by gaming enterprises rose by 2.7 percent year-on-year to a record high of MOP57.1 billion, accounting for 67.2 percent of the total,” the statistics bureau said in Tuesday’s report.
Stock of inward FDI to Macau reached MOP218.87 billion by the end of last year, with gaming accounting for about 58.5 percent of the total, down from 61 percent in 2013.
Outward direct investment made by Macau enterprises fell 59.3 percent year-on-year to MOP5.4 billion in 2014, “owing to a decrease of MOP8.5 billion in investment by gaming,” said the statistics bureau.
A separate set of data published last week showed that the gross value added by the gaming industry to Macau’s economy declined by 0.3 percent year-on-year in 2014, to MOP225.25 billion. The indicator measures sectoral contribution to the overall economy.
