South Korea’s leading foreigner-only casino operators – Paradise Co and Grand Korea Leisure (GKL) – enjoyed vastly contrasting fortunes in May as luck favored one but not the other.
In a filing with the Korea Exchange late last week, Paradise – which runs integrated resort Paradise City in Incheon plus casinos in Seoul, Busan and Jeju – reported casino sales of KRW70.1 billion (US$53.6 million) in May, up 30% on April sales and 313% higher year-on-year.
The improvement was aided by positive luck at the tables, given that table drop of KRW525.5 billion (US$401.6 million) was only 1.7% more than in April. It did, however, push casino sales for the first five months of 2023 to KRW258.4 million (US$197.5 million), representing a 194% improvement over the same period in 2022.
It was a different story for GKL, which also saw table drop remain largely steady at KRW287.6 billion (US$219.8 million), down just 2.9% on April, but suffered a 44.5% decline in casino sales to KRW25.4 billion (US$19.4 million). The May figure, which saw table games revenue fall 48.2% to KRW21.9 billion (US$16.7 million) but machine revenue rose by 2.4% to KRW3.46 billion (US$2.6 million), was 39.0% higher year-on-year.
For the year-to-date, casino sales are up 154% to KRW178.5 billion (US$136.4 million).
GKL operates three casinos in Seoul and Busan under the Seven Luck brand.
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