The Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation has released its financial results for the six months to the end of June showing that its net income improved by almost 24.8% year-on-year to hit $60.5 million while its half-year gaming revenues jumped by nearly 8.4% to reach $558.8 million.

The state-owned operator is responsible for 46 venues throughout the Philippines and it revealed that expenses for the first half of 2017 had increased by 9.7% year-on-year to $233.4 million. It shelled out taxes and contributions of $293.2 million including $246.6 million paid directly to the Asian nation’s federal treasury under a mandated 50% gross earnings duty.

The Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation additionally explained that its gaming income for the six-month period excluding these taxes reached $265.3 million, which was a swell of 8.3% year-on-year, while it had collected some $31.1 million from non-gaming activities.

Following his inauguration as the Philippines’ 16th president a little over a year ago, Rodrigo Duterte instructed the operator to begin selling off its casino estate in order to raise funds for the state and rid the enterprise of any possible conflict of interest concerns. The island nation’s Privatization Council is currently studying how to price the venues and their associated licenses while Andrea Domingo, Chief Executive Officer for the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation, recently told the Manila Bulletin newspaper that such a move could end up costing national coffers approximately $474 million a year.

The Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation posted net income of $88.1 million for the entirety of 2016, which represented a boost of 18.1% year-on-year and was led by an associated 22.9% swell in gaming revenues. Domingo last month predicted that the nation as a whole could expect to see an around 9% rise in aggregated gaming revenues for 2017 to just over $1.1 billion.