Japanese gaming conglomerate Universal Entertainment Corp says gross gaming revenue (GGR) at the group’s Okada Manila casino resort in the Philippine capital rose circa 68.2 percent quarter-on-quarter, to slightly more than PHP7.01 billion (US$137.0 million).
It was the second consecutive quarter of sequential growth at the property, according to company data published on Wednesday.
Universal Entertainment’s subsidiary, Tiger Resort, Leisure and Entertainment Inc, operates the Okada Manila casino resort (pictured). The company did not report standalone GGR figures for the fourth quarter of 2020.
Universal Entertainment announced in October last year a merger agreement with 26 Capital Acquisition Corp, which is expected to result in Okada Manila becoming a publicly traded company listed on Nasdaq. The 26 Capital entity is a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) listed on the Nasdaq stock market in the United States.
Okada Manila posted full-year GGR of PHP18.92 billion in 2021, an increase of 23.4 percent compared to 2020. Last year’s GGR was however under half the PHP39.79-billion GGR reported by the Tiger Resort entity for full-year 2019, just before the start of the Covid-19 pandemic.
VIP table game GGR for the three months to December 31, was PHP3.77 billion, up 69.7 percent quarter-on-quarter. Mass table games revenue was PHP1.34 billion compared to PHP848 million in the previous quarter, while gaming machine revenue was around PHP1.90 billion, up 73.2 percent quarter-on-quarter.
Full-year VIP table game GGR at Okada Manila was PHP9.62 billion, versus PHP8.27 billion in full-year 2020. Mass table games revenue stood at PHP3.81 billion in 2021, up by almost 27.1 percent year-on-year. Okada Manila reported gaming machine revenue for last year was just above PHP5.48 billion, compared to less than PHP4.06 billion in the previous year.
During the fourth-quarter reporting period, Manila’s casino resorts were subject to different limits on capacity as a Covid-19 countermeasure.
For the October-December period, Okada Manila also reported PHP445 million in “other revenue”, including hotel and retail revenue. In the previous quarter, “other revenue” had stood at PHP93 billion.
Adjusted segment earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) for the fourth quarter were slightly below PHP1.37 billion, versus EBITDA to the tune of PHP443 million in the third quarter. Full-2021 EBITDA was PHP2.31 billion, versus a negative result of PHP1.26-billion in 2020.
In the three months to December 31, the property had more than 761,000 visitors, versus 304,250 visitors in the previous quarter.
