2014 forecast lowered for Macao

After many signs of a slow down since last January, experts now began to revise their estimates for the downward trend of the industry in Macao for the year 2014.
The experts now expect a growth of only 11% instead of the previously estimated 13%.
This slowdown in performance is mainly due to the contraction of the market of VIP players as we reported in this article.
The global economic crisis must also be taken into account, as well as a series of scandals, and the smoking ban, that we discussed in this post.
In May the revenue reached a growth of only 9.3% instead of the expected 14%.
This led the experts to lowering their estimates.
The Wells Fargo bank was the first one to react.
They believe that revenues generated by VIP players are expected to decline 1.5% in 2014, compared to the increase of 3% from last year.
On the other hand however, the player market should increase by 30% while estimates initially predicted a 25% increase.
June however, is going to be particularly quiet because of the soccer World Cup.
Some experts, such as the Credit Suisse even believe that the overall revenues in the Macao market are going to stagnate, with a slight increase of 1%.
Whatever happens, the industry in this former Portuguese colony still has a bright future ahead of them.
The estimates are very optimistic about the future of the sales in 2018, and are expected to reach $115 billion.