Las Vegas Sands Corp, parent of Macau casino concessionaire Sands China Ltd, says it expects to relaunch in full the renovated rooms of The Venetian Macao (pictured) by Chinese New Year (CNY) 2028. Such investment would help the company meet its goal in terms of earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation, and amortisation (EBITDA).
So said Patrick Dumont, chairman and chief executive of Las Vegas Sands, during Wednesday’s call to discuss the firm’s second-quarter earnings. The group also runs the Marina Bay Sands casino complex in Singapore.
“We retain our goal of reaching US$700 million in quarterly EBITDA and beyond over time, as we fully implement our investment and operating strategies and as the Macau market grows in the future,” Mr Dumont stated.
The CEO said renovation of The Venetian Macao rooms and suites “commenced in March”.
While the group expects some of the inventory to be ready across the work period, the “target is to have all 2,900 rooms and suites completely refurbished and reintroduced by Chinese New Year 2028,” he said.
“We will also introduce new premium focused gaming salons and related amenities as a component of The Venetian [Macao] investment programme,” Mr Dumont added.
The group CEO said, referring to other hotel revamps in other parts of Sands China’s Cotai property portfolio: “The meaningful patron growth we have seen in The Londoner [Macao] and Grand suites of the Four Seasons provides support for these [additional] investments.”
“It’s important to note that the work we envision will not create significant disruption throughout the portfolio,” he added. “The scale of our portfolio will allow us to serve customers and other properties and elsewhere in each resort while work is in progress.”
Mr Dumont said the group would use its “scale advantage and product advantage together with service level improvements and targeted incentives to effectively compete” in the Macau market.
Grant Chum Kwan Lock, chief executive and president of Sands China, stated on the call that “approximately 400 keys” were unavailable from its inventory on average for the second quarter this year.
“You can assume that figure will fluctuate between 400 to 500 [rooms] every quarter, between now and into 2027,” Mr Chum stated.
Investment strategy
Mr Dumont also mentioned a “multiyear investment strategy” as the group updates its Macau portfolio and invests in “the highest value premium-mass segments”.
Mr Chum said that in terms of capital projects, Sands China still had a “long way to go” in terms of opportunity for ramping up business The Londoner Macao.
“As you can see in both The Londoner [Macao] and Four Seasons, we are, even for this quarter, above where we were in 2019 on a normalised basis,” the Sands China CEO noted. “So, that’s very positive evidence of how product upgrades can drive revenue growth and market share gains.”
Regarding The Venetian Macao revamp, Mr Chum said the group “should start to see the benefits of those new suites… throughout 2027”.
Regarding reinvestment strategy in Macau, Mr Dumont noted that the group had been “optimising reinvestment levels since the beginning of the year”.
“Our approach to reinvestment has remained consistent over the last several quarters,” he stressed.
The executive added: “If you look at the metrics, reinvestment as a percentage of revenue did increase during this [second] quarter. The increase as a percentage of revenue was driven by changes in business mix and lower hold percentage on our non-rolling play.”
Mr Dumont said the company’s goal was to “continue to remain consistent” with its reinvestment strategy and to “achieve greater profitability as revenues grow in the future”.
“With respect to operating expenses, we have elected over the last year to invest in additional table operating hours, increase sales, marketing, and customer service personnel and enhanced levels of customer service,” he stated.
According to the executive, the increased investment in operating expenses “should begin to level off in the second half of 2026”.
“These investments are critical to the achievement of our long-term objectives of being able to service our customers to the highest standards,” he added.
