Macau’s VIP casino gaming market again grew slower than its mass market counterpart, shows official data released over the weekend. In the three months ended June this year, VIP baccarat revenue reached MOP52.18 billion (US$6.5 billion), up by 7.5 percent year-on-year. As for mass-market casino gross gaming revenue, it reached MOP22.24 billion in the second quarter of 2012, up by 30 percent. Meanwhile, the number of live gaming tables at Macau’s casinos reached 5,498 by the end of June, just two units below the official 5,500 cap, in-place until next year. That raises further eyebrows regarding the tables Sands China Ltd will need for the second phase of its Sands Cotai Central project, scheduled to open in September. “Our understanding is that we have another 200 new tables that we were essentially promised [by the government],” Sands China’s chief operating officer David Sisk told Macau Business in March. The government has yet to comment on the existence of such deal.
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