The gambling control board of Macau released its report on the island’s gambling revenues for February late Monday evening, and the report was, perhaps amazingly, slightly better than analysts had expected. The year-over-year drop in revenues was a record 48.6% to about $2.45 billion. In the month of January, revenues fell 17.4%, after sliding 2.6% for all of 2014, the first-ever year of gambling revenue declines for Macau.
Casino revenue growth peaked in February 2014 at around $4.76 billion. Growth slowed each month before turning into a loss of 3.7% in June. Revenues have not posted a year-over-year gain since.
A government crackdown on extravagant spending and corruption is being blamed for the decline in VIP visits to Macau casinos. The Chinese government cut the number of times a Chinese citizen may visit Macau and has trimmed the number of days a citizen may spend in Macau on a transit visa from seven days to five.
Analysts were expecting a drop of 54% in February revenues, so the actual drop was a little smaller than expected, and anticipated resort openings later this year are expected to attract more mass market gamblers. Whether that will be enough to offset the loss of VIP visitors remains to be seen. Year-over-year comparisons also get easier after June, and that also helps.
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Even though the revenue decline was record-setting, it was not as bad as feared and casino stocks held their Tuesday morning. Melco Crown Entertainment Ltd. (NASDAQ: MPEL) traded up around 3%, at $24.89 in a 52-week range of $21.04 to $45.70.
Las Vegas Sands Corp. (NYSE: LVS) traded up about 0.7%, at $57.49 in a 52-week range of $49.82 to $88.28.
MGM Resorts International (NYSE: MGM) traded at $22.04, up about 0.8% compared with Wednesday’s closing price of $21.87. The stock’s 52-week range is $17.25 to $28.75.
Wynn Resorts Ltd. (NASDAQ: WYNN) traded down about 4.4%, at $141.41 in a 52-week range of $133.58 to $249.31. The share price hit is more likely due to a dispute between chairman and CEO Steve Wynn and his former wife over a board seat than it is to the drop in revenues in Macau.
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