Japanese brokerage Nomura is sticking to its bullish forecast that December’s casino gross gaming revenue (GGR) in Macau will be about 10 percent to 15 percent greater than a year ago. Instinet, Nomura’s stockbroking division, issued a note on Monday which said GGR averaged about MOP843 million (US$104.7 million) a day last week and MOP878 million a day the week before.
Nomura analysts Harry Curtis, Daniel Adam and Brian Dobson say that data is enough to confirm an earlier estimate for December’s GGR of between MOP25 billion to 26 billion.
“Assuming December GGR per day is flat sequentially versus the average in November, we estimate GGR for the month will be around MOP25 billion to MOP26 billion,” they wrote.
So far this month, Nomura says average daily GGR in the mass-market segment is about 4 percent or 5 percent higher than in November and volume in the VIP market about 3 percent higher.
In another note issued on Monday, brokerage Sanford C. Bernstein Ltd says its channel checks indicate that Macau GGR is about MOP13.8 billion so far this month, meaning average daily GGR is about MOP862 million, or 12 percent more than in the corresponding period a year ago. In all of last December average daily GGR was MOP768 million, according to Sanford C. Bernstein.
Sanford Bernstein says volume in the VIP market so far this month is trending slightly higher than last month, and that mass-market GGR is also a touch greater. “Both segments have benefitted from events, including several days of Jay Chou’s The Invincible Concert Tour held at the Venetian [Macao],” Sanford Bernstein analysts Vitaly Umansky, Eunice Lee and Kelsey Zhu wrote.
In the light of the brokerage’s estimates of GGR so far this month, Sanford Bernstein has increased its forecast of GGR for December to between MOP25 billion and MOP26 billion, or between 12 percent and 15 percent more than a year ago, having forecast previously annual growth between 8 percent and 10 percent.
“This assumes that average daily revenue for the remainder of the month will be in the MOP775 million to MOP825 million range, which is below the current run rate for the month,” wrote the Sanford Bernstein team.
The Macau government’s Gaming Inspection and Coordination Bureau said revenue at the city’s casinos was almost MOP25 billion last month. That represented growth of 8.5 percent compared to November 2017. This year’s best return so far was in October when MOP27.33 billion in GGR was recorded. It was also the best monthly tally since October 2014, when Macau’s casino GGR was MOP28.03 billion.
