In local currency, the drop in big bets was 4.8 billion patacas, justified, in part, by the crisis of the Covid-19 pandemic that led big bettors to move away from that business segment.
In fact, history shows that the first quarter of the year is, according to Lusa, traditionally a high season for tourism in the Chinese region, especially due to the Lunar New Year celebrations. But the result of VIP gaming, in the first three months of 2022, was the lowest since the second quarter of 2020, when much of mainland China, Macau's main casino market, was in lockdown due to the Covid 19 pandemic.
The decline in high-end bookmakers was almost twice that of the entire gaming industry in Macau, whose revenues fell by 24.8% in the first quarter of this year.
Only in November last year, the Macau gaming industry was affected by the fall of the world's largest VIP bookmaker, Suncity, when the Macau authorities ordered the preventive detention of its executive director, Alvin Chau.
A few days later, says Lusa, Suncity announced the end of operations related to player recruiters, after, on November 30, it closed the VIP gaming rooms in Macau, with the group being present in more than 40% of the territory's casinos.
On January 30, the Macau Judiciary Police announced the arrest of two more businessmen on suspicion of illicit gambling, money laundering and criminal association, including the leader of the Tak Chun group, which has a license to operate as a junket.
The chronology of events continues. Also in March, another Macau gaming promoter, the Macau Golden Group, a historic partner of SJM, announced the end of its activity, according to the gaming website GGRAsia.
The number of gaming promoter licenses in Macau issued for this year by the Gaming Inspection and Coordination Directorate dropped from 85 to 46.
Gambling accounts for around 80% of government revenue and 55.5% of Macau's Gross Domestic Product (GDP), in an industry that employs more than 80,000 people, that is, 17.23% of the employed population.
Source: Forbes África Lusófona
