The ongoing coronavirus pandemic is reportedly continuing to negatively impact the 39 casinos in Macau as their aggregated gross gaming revenues for the whole of last month dropped by 90% year-on-year to stand at just over $276.97 million.

According to a report from GGRAsia citing official information from the Gaming Inspection and Coordination Bureau regulator, September was the sixth consecutive month in which the city’s combined gross gaming revenues fell by at least 90% year-on-year although the finishing tally conversely represented a 66% improvement on the final August reckoning of $166.59 million.

Long-term lag:

Macau is home to some of the world’s most iconic casinos including the lotus-shaped Casino Grand Lisboa with the source moreover reporting that these properties have now managed to chalk up aggregated gross gaming revenues since the start of 2020 of $4.83 billion, which equates to a decline of just over 82.49% when compared with the $27.59 billion recorded for the same nine-month period last year.

Tourism troubles:

September’s result reportedly also came after officials in Beijing began re-issuing group travel and Individual Visit Scheme (IVS) visas for mainland residents following an over five-month stoppage. However, international brokerage Sanford C Bernstein Limited reportedly used a note to detail that the combined revenue figure for the 30-day period had nevertheless been ‘weaker than expected’ due to the gradual easing of coronavirus-related restrictions and ‘concerns over money flows’ into the city’s casino market.

Increasing interest:

Sanford C Bernstein Limited reportedly furthermore detailed that Macau had experienced reduced visitor volumes from neighboring Guangdong Province in September ‘on the back of visa restart in late August’ with its casinos suffering from an associated ‘weakness in VIP and hold’. This purportedly came despite the former Portuguese enclave welcoming as many as 18,400 mainland tourists a day last month, which was a considerable improvement on the early-August figure of only about 5,000.