Inside Asian Gaming

IAG APR 2020年4月 亞博匯 25 封面故事 Sands and Caesars Entertainment Corp close their Las Vegas Strip properties, the governor of Nevada issued an unprecedented order for all non-essential businesses in the state to close for one month, essentially shutting down hundreds of casinos on the spot. As of midday on 25 March, all 465 commercial casinos and 508 of 534 tribal casinos nationwide had closed their doors, leaving around 649,000 casino employees out of work. By the end of the month, casino closures had become the norm from Europe to Australia and everywhere in between – Korea, Malaysia, Saipan, India, Nepal and beyond. And yet, to this day, the industry finds itself with one eye still fixed on Macau, not only as the leader of the global casino world but, ironically, as one of the very few jurisdictions in which casinos are still operating. Just as Macau was the first to shut its doors, this tiny yet highly lucrative 30 square kilometer slice of land could well be the one to provide a much-needed glimmer of hope that brighter days lie ahead. The lingering question, given China’s cancellation of tour groups to Macau, as well as the Individual Visit Scheme (IVS) which accounted for 47% of all visitors in 2019, is exactly when that might be. “I think it all really depends on when things come back on line and there are two facets to that,” offers Vitaly Umansky, Senior Research Analyst – Global Gaming for brokerage Sanford C Bernstein. “One is the visas and a whole host of issues with that, and the second is all the transport activity. It’s hard to say whether things will come back in May and everything is back to where it was by November or December. It’s purely guesswork, right? And the timing is guesswork. Even the ramp up process is guesswork because we don’t know what the ramp up will look like from the perspective of visa issuance and transport activity. Those are kind of Macau specific. “Right now the ferries are not running, the planes are not flying, there are no IVS schedules, there are no group visas, no authorized group travel so all of that needs to come online and nobody has any insight 道阻且長 儘管當初澳門博彩業暫停營運期僅維持了15天，但該消息一 出仍然令人難以置信，《亞博匯》當時有關這一歷史時刻的突發新 聞報道迅速成為有史以來點擊率最高的文章——頁面瀏覽量逾 21,000，並被在社交媒體上共享約7,500次，這對於專注於報道博 彩行業新聞的B2B網站而言是個驚人的數字。然而事實很快表明， 澳門並非唯一這麼做的地方。 3月15日週日，菲律賓博彩監管機構PAGCOR宣佈，因應馬尼 拉大都會地區實施的社區隔離措施，將關閉馬尼拉的所有博彩業 務，為期一個月，即刻生效。48小時之後，PAGCOR將該關閉令實施 範圍擴大到整個菲律賓主島呂宋島，包括菲律賓離岸博彩營運商 (Philippine Offshore Gaming Operator, POGO)亦須暫停營業。 幾日之內，隨著拉斯維加斯「四大」營運商—即美高梅國際酒 店集團、永利渡假村、拉斯維加斯金沙集團及凱撒娛樂集團—相 繼宣佈其位於拉斯維加斯大道上的物業將閉門謝客，內華達州州 長發佈了一項前所未有的指令，要求該州所有非必要企業暫停營 運一個月，意即該州數百間賭場須即時關閉。截至3月25日中午， 全美所有465個商業賭場和534個部落賭場中的508家已經關門， 約64.9萬名賭場員工失業。 及至三月底，從歐洲到澳洲，再到韓國、馬來西亞、塞班、印 度、尼泊爾等地，關閉賭場儼然已成為常見之舉。 而如今，博彩業依然不忘把目光注視着澳門，不僅因為這城 市是全球博彩業領銜之地，而且頗值得玩味的是，這裡目前也是 全球少數幾個娛樂場仍在營業的司法管轄區之一。 雖然澳門曾是最早關閉賭場的地方，但這片僅有30平方公里 土地、面積雖小卻業務蓬勃且繁榮的城市，為眾人帶來灰暗之中 亟需的一線希望，讓人相信還有光明的未來。 有鑒於現時中國內地停止了所有赴澳旅行團，而且有47%在 2019年到訪澳門旅客都使用的個人自由行簽證的審批亦被暫停， 現在唯一的問題就是：何時才見晨曦。 證券商Sanford C Bernstein的全球博彩高級研究分析師Vita- ly Umansky表示：「我認為何日回復正常將取決於兩個方面。」 「一個是簽證以及一系列相關問題，另一個則是交通運輸。 現時還難說一切是否會在五月恢復到過往正常的狀態。」 「就算說十一月抑或十二月，都不過是純粹臆測，是嗎？然而 時機就是臆測。甚至行業恢復的過程目前也只能靠猜測，因為我 們尚不知一旦簽證政策放開及交通運輸恢復後，整個恢復過程會 有多快。這也是澳門特有的現象。」 「現在，輪渡停航、飛機停飛，團體簽證跟個人自由行簽證恢 復發放尚無時間表，團體遊亦未放開，所有這些必須逐一恢復，但沒 有人對此有所了解。我不知道，營運商不知道，甚至政府也不知道。」 早在澳門博監局於三月初公佈二月的博彩總收入（GGR）數