Gaming | Market ready to bounce back, says ‘Mad Money’ host

Jim Cramer, the host of CNBC’s “Mad Money” television show, has claimed that Macau’s gaming market could grow further, after a 1.1 percent increase in the city’s gambling revenue last month.
After the market’s two-year downturn, the slight growth has fueled casino stock gains. Cramer said the ideal time to buy these stocks was early this year, highlighting that Steve Wynn had made some “incredibly aggressive” insider buys of Wynn Resort’s stocks in December and January.
“If you’re looking for a singular moment to call the bottom of Macau, it wasn’t the recent pickup in August numbers. It was on January 19 when Wynn disclosed that he bought a million shares of his own stock,” he explained.
The expert said that the stock purchase by Wynn’s CEO was the green light to invest in the region’s gaming stocks.
“The stock market is basically a prediction machine that forecasts what is going to happen roughly six months into the future, and it predicted this pickup in Macau,” he said.
Meanwhile, the TV host noted that the recent openings of Wynn Palace and The Parisian Macao were “very well timed.”
Gambling tycoon Lui Chewoo previously stated that it is too early to call the growth a recovery, but added that mass market is currently a better way to play than VIP gambling.
Cramer then pointed to Las Vegas Sands as the safer option because of its mass-market exposure. For investors who prefer long odds with higher payoffs, he noted that Wynn could make a significant profit, should rich VIP gamblers return to the peninsula.
“If, like me, you believe that Macau is ready to bounce back, then both stocks have more room to run,” Cramer said.