The Gaming Inspection and Coordination Bureau of Macau has released its gaming revenue figures for October 2023, with the region having collected monthly gross income of MOP$19.5bn ($1.99bn).
An increase of 30% from last month, and the highest monthly gross income of the year so far, October has shown itself to be a significant month for the gambling market in Macau. Tracking gambling revenue in Macau over the past five years yields some interesting results.
In 2019, October's revenue was MOP26.4bn, and in 2023 this number returned closer to pre Covid-19 recordings. However, October’s monthly income was no match for sanctions put in place during Covid-19, which restricted Macau's gambling earnings significantly.
October was not the highest change in income from this time last year, however. That accomplishment was one rewarded to July, which saw its monthly gross income from July 2022 to July 2023 increase by over 4000%.
As numbers continue to grow steadily from MOP$11.58bn in January to MOP$15.2bn in June to MOP$19.5bn in October, the question of whether Macau's gambling market will be able to recover to its position pre-Covid is becoming closer to being a reality.
It is true that there is still growth and recovery to be done, and it will require a monthly gross income increase of over 35% for Macau's October 2023 revenue to match that of October 2019.
But, with an increase in gaming revenue of 400% from this time last year, achieving this additional growth to return to the 2019 status quo seems relatively achievable.
MGM China President & COO Hubert Wang also spoke to the GI Huddle about the increased profitability of the mass market reducing the need to match past revenue totals.
