GGRAsia – Macau gaming tax revenue US$4.9bln in year to Aug

Macau gaming tax revenue US$4.9bln in year to Aug

Sep 15, 2023 Newsdesk Latest News, Macau, Top of the deck

The Macau government collected just below MOP39.12 billion (US$4.85 billion) in fiscal revenue from taxes on gaming in the first eight months of this year, according to the latest data released by the city’s Financial Services Bureau.

The aggregate take for January to August was up 175.4 percent compared with the prior-year period, a time when Covid-19-related travel restrictions were still in place.

In August alone, the government collected MOP6.44 billion in revenue from gaming taxes, up 9.5 percent month-on-month.

Under Macau’s new, 10-year gaming concession system that came into effect on January 1, the effective tax on casino gross gaming revenue (GGR) is 40 percent.

Macau’s casino GGR for the eight months to August 31 reached MOP114.01 billion, a rise of 295.1 percent from the comparable 2022 period. GGR in August rose 3.3 percent month-on-month, to MOP17.21 billion, the best monthly performance since January 2020, at the very beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic.

The tax-take figures in a given calendar period and the city’s casino GGR in such a time frame are not directly comparable for a number of reasons. They include the fact that there is typically a delay between the point where GGR is recorded in Macau casino operations and the point at which tax is registered by the Macau government as having been paid on such play.

The Macau government has previously said it estimates the city’s 2023 casino GGR to be MOP130 billion.

According to the government’s budget plan, revenue from gaming taxes should reach just above MOP50.85 billion this year. The take for the first eight months of 2023 represents 76.9 percent of that figure.