April two twenty twenty. On the ground in Macau, the casino floors are empty. Tables sit idle. Dealers wait for players who never come.
The scene at the entrance: temperature checks for every visitor. Non-residents with recent travel abroad turned away. China has slashed individual and group visas to the territory as a safety precaution. Footfall has collapsed.
By nightfall, the numbers tell the story. Gross gaming revenue plunged seventy-nine point seven percent in March to five point two six billion patacas – six hundred fifty-eight point seven million US dollars. February saw an eighty-seven point eight percent drop. Six straight months of decline. In the first three months of twenty twenty, gross gaming revenues declined sixty percent year over year to thirty point four eight billion patacas – three point eight billion dollars.
Residents describe a city that runs on gaming – eighty percent of government tax revenue comes from casinos. The government has halved its twenty twenty forecast to one hundred thirty billion patacas, sixteen billion dollars, from the prior two hundred sixty billion.
Casino operators were already reeling from a China slowdown and the Beijing-Washington trade war. The outbreak aggravated every wound.
Las Vegas faces the same silence. Casinos closed to contain the virus. Australia, South Korea, the Philippines, Cambodia – all shut down gaming floors.
Wall Street has noticed. Wynn Resorts shares down sixty-one point one percent year to date. Sixty-day estimates for the current year revised downward by eighty-eight point one percent to sixty-six cents. MGM Resorts down sixty-three point three percent year to date. The company’s earnings estimates for the current quarter and year declined thirty-two cents and ninety-seven cents respectively. Las Vegas Sands down forty-one point six percent year to date. Current-year estimates cut by fifteen point five percent to two dollars fifty-one cents. Melco Resorts down forty-nine point two percent year to date. Earnings estimates for the current quarter and year dropped seventy-two cents and one dollar fifty-four cents respectively.
The local government is trying vouchers worth three hundred seventy-five dollars for citizens to spend anywhere in Macau. A stimulus for a city built on bets that aren’t being placed.
Twenty twenty is shaping up to be a forgettable year for the gaming industry. The recovery timeline remains unwritten.
