The daily run-rate of Macau’s casino gross gaming revenue (GGR) for October 1 to October 6 – all within China’s seven-day National Day holiday – was estimated at just above MOP1.08 billion (US$135.4 million), the highest level in five years since the comparable October Golden Week holiday in 2019. So suggested JP Morgan Securities (Asia Pacific) Ltd in a Monday memo, citing its channel checks.
“Based on our checks, gross gaming revenue (GGR) for the first six days of October was MOP6.5 billion, implying MOP1,083 million a day or +30 percent year-on-year. This has not only beaten our or the market’s expectations (MOP850 million to MOP900 million a day) by a significant margin, but was also the highest run-rate in five years since 2019 October Golden Week (MOP1.16 billion a day),” wrote JP Morgan’s DS Kim, Mufan Shi and Selina Li.
The estimated average daily run rate for the first six days of this month indicated a “very strong- and golden-” holiday season, tracking almost 20 percent above May’s Labour Day holiday season GGR, which was MOP910 million a day, the JP Morgan analysts mentioned.
Citigroup and CLSA Ltd, had respectively mentioned in recent notes – based on field visits during the holidays – that bet sizes and bet volume had been strong during October Golden Week.
JP Morgan said the holiday result so far, “implies that mass GGR recovered to 130 percent to 140 percent of pre-Covid-[19] levels,” while the VIP segment was at “30 percent to 35 percent” of pre-pandemic. The latest perfomance in both categories “significantly exceeded third quarter’s recovery rates of circa 110 percent and circa 25 percent, respectively,” the analysts noted.
Macau received an aggregate 916,215 visitors from October 1 to October 6, inclusive. Of that tally, 773,895 were from the Chinese mainland. That was a 4.5-percent improvement on the mainlander volume in the first six days of the October Golden Week in 2019, show archive data from Macao Government Tourism Office.
The JP Morgan analysts wrote in their Monday note: “The significant acceleration in mass GGR is particularly encouraging, as it indicates that spending per capita also improved sharply, by around 25 percent versus pre-Covid levels on our ‘guesstimates’ (130 to 140 percent mass GGR recovery versus 105 percent recovery in mainland visitors during the Golden Week).”
They also mentioned, referring to a popular Hong Kong entertainer: “Anecdotally, we heard quite a few high-end premium mass players had delayed their September trip to this Golden Week, to attend the Andy Lau concert (October 3 to October 6 at Galaxy’s Arena), and this seems to have helped the above-seasonal recovery in premium mass.”
The JP Morgan team estimate Macau’s casino GGR for the fourth quarter this year will reach MOP56.6 billion. If realised, that would represent a 5-percent growth year-on-year and a 78-percent recovery from the same quarter in 2019, according to the institution’s Monday memo.
