June sales from gaming at Paradise Co Ltd, which runs foreigner-only casinos in South Korea, went down 25.0 percent compared to May, the firm said in a Wednesday filing to the Korea Exchange.
Such sales were KRW57.11 billion (US$41.1 million), versus nearly KRW76.17 billion in May. Measured year-on-year, such sales fell by 39.3 percent.
Table-game sales were KRW53.52 billion, equal to 93.7 percent of all June casino sales. The rest was machine-game sales, at nearly KRW3.59 billion.
June casino drop – money exchanged for chips at the table – was just under KRW531.84 billion, down 12.2 perent month-on-month.
Year-on-year, June 2024 casino drop was down 0.2 percent, almost flat versus June 2023.
June’s casino sales result meant that the first-half tally was KRW423.06 billion, a rise of 20.5 percent year-on-year.
Casino drop for the first six months this year was just over KRW3.43 trillion, a 20.9-percent improvement on the prior-year period.
Paradise Co directly operates three casino venues: Walkerhill in Seoul; Paradise Jeju (pictured) on Jeju island; and a property in the port city of Busan.
It also has a venture with Japan’s Sega Sammy Holdings Inc, for the Paradise City casino resort at Incheon, near South Korea’s main airport.
At a Tuesday briefing at Paradise City, Choi Jong-hwan, Paradise Co’s chief executive, said the firm intended to open in September new VIP space at Walkerhill, and to boost its appeal to high-end customers from China and elsewhere in the region.
He also stated the group would start building this year a new luxury hotel in eastern Seoul’s Jangchung neighbourhood with the aim of opening it in 2028.
There was no mention of whether there was an aim to have a casino in the new property.
