Doubling down

摘要

After years of spectacular growth that propelled Macau past Las Vegas to become the gambling capital of the world, the territory has hit a rough patch. So you might expect that the gathering of the casino industry's leaders that took place there this week would be dominated by talk of retrenchment. Instead, the tycoons boasted of their grand plans for expansion. Fat-cats from the Chinese mainland, where gambling remains illegal, used to be Macau's mainstay. But as the Communist Party's leaders have cracked down on corruption over the past two years, and as rival casinos in Australia, the Philippines and elsewhere have begun to draw big-spending gamblers away, the flood of high-rollers into Macau has slowed to a trickle. Its gambling revenues have plunged from nearly $13 billion in the first quarter of 2014 to under $8 billion in the first three months of 2015 (see chart). Shares in its gambling firms have fallen by half since the start of 2014, wiping more than $90 billion off their combined market value.