No change to HK$23-24BN projection for January
In what will likely be considered a disappointment, total Macau gross gaming revenues (GGR) should finish the month around HK$23.5 billion, up around 30% YoY. Recent expectations have been elevated, unfortunately. However, our original projection was HK$23-24 billion, so we wouldn’t exactly consider January a bad month. February does face a comp that included the Chinese New Year (CNY) celebration last year, although the VIP hold comparison is quite easy.
In terms of market share, LVS is the clear winner this month. As we expected, LVS’s big junket effort paid off handsomely during the CNY celebration with all the whales in town. Both MPEL and WYNN posted disappointing January market shares. Hold likely played a role, particularly for MPEL. We would expect the Macau stocks to be weak today with the possible exception of LVS.
With a lack of near-term positive catalysts in Macau – although analysts still need to raise Q4 estimates for MPEL – and the recent big move, Macau stocks could underperform.
