Macau’s hotel occupancy and daily room rates are showing unprecedented strength in the post-Chinese New Year period, with at least two hotels fully booked through February and many others close to capacity, according to a new research report from Morgan Stanley.
The report by analysts Praveen Choudhary and Gareth Leung follows a survey of multiple Macau hotels in the wake of Chinese New Year with a specific focus on the seven nights from 18 to 24 February, which comes three weeks after Chinese New Year.
While Macau has traditionally quietened down post-CNY, Morgan Stanley’s study shows quote the opposite in 2023 with hotel occupancy and ADR (average daily rate) remaining strong.
“We called some major casino hotels in Macau and found strong bookings for most of them,” the analysts said.
“In particular, [Melco’s] Morpheus and Ritz-Carlton (at Galaxy Macau) are fully booked for the entire month of February (with Morpheus fully booked for March as well). Furthermore, nine out of our 25 surveyed hotels are fully booked for all seven days versus only three out of 25 for 2019 post CNY.”
The Morgan Stanley survey also reveals that room rates for many hotels are comfortably exceeding that of the May 2021 Golden Week, which was the best holiday period since COVID.
On this metric, JW Marriott at Galaxy is running room rates at 292% of May 2021 levels, with The Parisian Macao at 199%, Sands Macao at 171%, Sheraton at 145%, The Venetian Macao at 121% and Wynn Palace at 112%.
“This should bode well for February GGR,” the analysts wrote.
