Casino sales in February at Grand Korea Leisure Co Ltd (GKL), an operator in South Korea of foreigner-only casinos, increased by 71.9 percent month-on-month, to KRW33.68 billion (US$25.3 million), the company said in a Monday filing to the Korea Exchange. The latest monthly tally was down 8.4 percent from the prior-year period.
In February, table-game sales were nearly KRW31.19 billion, up 88.9 percent sequentially, but a decline of 9.1 percent from a year ago.
Machine-game sales were nearly KRW2.5 billion, down 19.2 percent sequentially but up slightly by 1.6 percent from a year ago.
The February tally took Grand Korea Leisure’s aggregate casino sales of the first two months of this year to nearly KRW53.28 billion, a decline of 22.6 percent year-on-year.
Grand Korea Leisure runs three foreigner-only Seven Luck-branded casinos: two in the capital Seoul, including in Gangnam (pictured), and one in the southeastern port city of Busan.
The company is a subsidiary of the Korea Tourism Organization, which in turn is affiliated to the country’s Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism.
The company’s amount of “drop” – money paid by customers to purchase gaming chips – was nearly KRW291.61 billion for February, down 3.9 percent sequentially, but up 39.1 percent from February 2023.
The drop amount for January and February combined reached KRW594.94 billion, up 23.4 percent year-on-year.
The company gave no commentary on the reasons for any of the changes.
