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Below is an excerpt from a complimentary research note by our Gaming, Lodging & Leisure analyst Todd Jordan. Please contact sales@hedgeye.com to read more of our GLL research. |
MACAU | Bullish Signals Under The Hood
Macau visitation and overall Gross gaming revenue (GGR) continue to lag virtually all US markets, but there are some positives under the hood.
Visitation counts are still down 75%+ vs ’19 levels, but GGR trends are outperforming that mark and that’s due to the mix of visitors coming to Macau which appear to be of higher quality.
People coming to Macau are generally staying overnight and around peak periods there’s actually a shortage of hotel capacity.
Even in April, when there were limited draws to the market, Macau hotel occupancy was 66% which is the best performance for the market since Covid and a nice acceleration vs March.
In conjunction with these stronger occupancy figures, Individual Visit Scheme (IVS visitation) to Macau also accelerated and was up 12% month over month, though still down 69% vs 2019 levels.
Our point here?
The Macau market is still in the early (early) days of recovery, but under the hood we’re seeing more improvement than perhaps that headline figures would indicate – higher quality visitation and stays should lead to outperforming GGR.
We still like the Macau stocks and view Las Vegas Sands (LVS) and Wynn Resorts (WYNN) as the best ways to play the upcycle.
