It will not come as a surprise if the government chooses to extend casino licenses by between six to 12 months after their expiration in June next year, according to brokerage firm JP Morgan.
This expectation follows the conclusion of the 45-day public consultation period on amendments to the gaming law.
The government has not yet provided guarantees that existing concessions will be renewed following their impending June 2022 expiration, despite various sectors calling on the government to extend validity of the concessions due to the adverse effects of the pandemic on the industry.
Analysts DS Kim, Amanda Cheng and Livy Lyu believe that issuing new concessions by June 26, 2022 will be a “very tight schedule,” adding that “we wouldn’t be surprised if the government extends the current term by six to 12 months.”
“The next milestone will be the summary report on public consultation, which the government is required to publish before mid-March (180 days after the public consultation),” the analysts said in a note that was quoted in an Inside Asia Gaming report.
They anticipate the next steps will be “submission of the final draft of the revised gaming law which, once approved by the Legislative Assembly, will set the basis for concession re-tendering. A public bidding process should then follow, from which the government will pick the next concessionaires.”
The vice-president and chief executive officer of SJM Holdings Ltd, Ambrose So, has previously called for the SAR government to consider extending the six current gaming concessions for at least one year, and to hold off seeking license tenders until the global pandemic and economy have stabilized.
These moves can “buy Macau’s government more time,” to collect more data relevant in putting together new tender standards and requirements, he explained.
Recently, Las Vegas Sands expressed its confidence in the gaming concession renewal process, boasting of its track record, development, and investment in the city, and noting that it is “prepared for it” despite the current global pandemic crisis.
At a gaming public consultation session, scholar and former lawmaker Davis Fong expressed a view that the the validity of casino licenses in Macau should be changed to 10+5 years from the current 20+5.
Gov’t’s gaming tax revenue in Sept. down 46% month-on-month
The government’s gaming tax revenue was just MOP1.77 billion during the month of September, a significant drop of 45.9% from the MOP3.27 billion collected in August.
Macau’s gross gaming revenue (GGR) recorded an increase of 32.4% in September, reaching MOP5.88 billion following the steep revenue downturn in August caused by the Delta variant cases and resulting border restrictions.
September’s figure is the second-lowest GGR the city has recorded this year.
Considering last month’s revenue from gaming, it is now clearly impossible for the city to reach this year’s goal of MOP50.01 billion from gaming tax as September’s revenue was only 54.5% of the month’s goal.
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