The Lunar New Year finds Macau’s 17 major casino hotels booked solid for the weeklong holiday.
“For resorts, this is almost like reaping the windfall of lucky money,” Capital Securities analyst Lantis Li told Bloomberg.
Lucky money, also known as “Hong Bao” in Mandarin or “Lai See” in Cantonese, refers to the cash gifts traditionally handed out on New Year, which begins this Sunday with festivities lasting through next week.
Melco Crown Chairman Lawrence Ho said his employees told him there was “literally physically fighting over rooms” and predicted the city would be “jam packed” over the holiday.
“Demand for hotel rooms is exceptionally strong with 100% occupancy,” Yoko Ku, a spokeswoman at Galaxy Entertainment, told Bloomberg.
“The novelty factor will drive more mainland visitors to Cotai,” Li said, which in turn should benefit Galaxy, Melco Crown and Sands China.
Sands China has been adding more hotel rooms to its Sands Cotai Central resort complex and recently was awarded 200 more precious table games by the government. Sands has 9,210 hotel rooms in Macau, which account for about 40% of the city’s hotel room supply, while Galaxy has more than 2,700 hotel rooms.
“Growth in Macau is supply-driven,” said Li. “As long as we have more hotel rooms to support the increase in the number of travelers, the growth can be sustainable.”
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