1. Deflation (measured by the average change in CPI over 12 months, and which is nothing more than negative inflation) started in March this year and has worsened monthly, until July. Having reached its lowest point in June (-0.58%), deflation stood at -0.57% in July and -0.54% in August. The reason for this lower deflation is simple, for the first time this year, the year-on-year change turned positive in July. Note that the year-on-year change has been negative since September last year!
The September data will be released later in October, but I forecast inflation to be negative (deflation) in September even if the year-on-year change continues positive. Probably in September, deflation will have fallen in a range between -0.41 and -0.45 percent!
At best, we will only return to inflation in the last month of the year; if, in the meantime, the economy doesn’t sink further, which may well happen in these crazy times.
I predicted -0.55 percent deflation in August. It remained at -0.54 percent, although low in the range that had been advanced (-0.58 to -0.54)!
2. The Government of Macau has set a target of 130 billion for gaming revenue in 2021.
Possible?
At the beginning of the year, perhaps, as it was only necessary for the gaming industry to produce something like 10.833 billion per month to meet that goal.
The target for gaming is of course the target for government budgeted revenues for 2021.
All prudence is lost! The time has come for second, third and more public budgetary revisions.
Once the figures published by the DICJ for August were made known, things became more problematic.
It will be necessary for gaming to produce something like 17.023 billion from September to December each month in order to reach 130 billion at the end of the year.
The worst performer for gaming forecasts is Morgan Stanley, who on January 11 of this year, despite reducing their initial forecasts by 10 percent, anticipated that by the end of the year those revenues would reach 184.86 billion patacas.
Now, starting in September, the Virgin Mary would need to perform a great miracle, as it would now need 30.738 billion patacas each month to reach this new goal, albeit smaller.
There is no God for this here game that starts to stink like the devil. Nor is there a Motherland to extend a hand to all these sinners.
Mathematically and economically, it is still possible to achieve the Government’s forecast, golden week is already lost, but not Morgan Stanley’s, for which we would have to return to the good times of 2014 or before, nor even the Deutsch Bank’s or Fitch’s forecast, though much more recent.
Such a number is sacrilege for the people of the North.
Distributing so much money for an activity that violates the ‘new normal’ book of rules, I don’t think it’s likely today.
Wrong are those who think that these noble people of the North will accept this gross error only because of the wretched pelf!
These are real patriots, not ’pocket patriots’ like the many false ones we know.
We only must look at the draft document for public consultation on the gaming law to see that a typhoon seems to be on its way. Is there no one who is a little more prudent in this land that was once the City of the Name of God?
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