The Gaming Inspection and Co-ordination Bureau (DICJ) revealed this Thursday that VIP gaming revenues for the whole of 2017 – represented by VIP Baccarat – went up 26.6 per cent yearly to MOP150.67 billion.
Meanwhile the Macau mass market results for last year went up 10.3 per cent yearly to MOP115.07 billion.
The last three months of 2017 saw VIP results increase 22 per cent to reach MOP40.63 billion while mass market gaming revenues went up 17.1 per cent to MOP31.72 billion.
Union Gaming considered that the results surpassed expectations that VIP yearly growth would be around 30 per cent with mass expected at around 10 per cent.
In a note from Union Gaming, Grant Govertsen, Managing Director, Head of Asia Equity Research, said “we would attribute another part of the change in growth velocities to a clear resurgence in the lower tiers of mass market as we’ve witnessed a significant uptick in low-end patrons (e.g. the HK ferry terminal has been bursting at the seams more recently). Finally, we could also be witnessing an unwinding of the reclassification of table games in advance of the new smoking law.”
The last three months of 2017 saw total gaming results go up 19.8 per cent year-on-year to reach MOP72.36 billion.
Non-VIP Baccarat rose 18.6 per cent year-on-year to MOP23.45 billion in the last quarter of 2017 while slot machine results hiked 18.5 per cent yearly to MOP3.62 billion.
The number of tables operating in the same period went down 30 tables to 6,419.
[Edited by Sheyla Zandonai]
