Paying for Covid Zero in Macau

The city’s casinos are racking up losses as Chinese gamblers face restrictions on travel

- James E. Ellis and David Rocks

In 2019 gambling revenue in Macau was six times that of Las Vegas. This year the Nevada gaming hub has edged ahead of its Asian rival as the Chinese-controlled territory grapples with the effects of Beijing’s “Covid-zero” policy, which seeks to stamp out infections no matter the cost.

In recent weeks, Macau’s slot machines have fallen silent and its gaming floors have emptied while the enclave endures a lockdown to tame its biggest Covid-19 outbreak. That’s adding to months of virus curbs in China that have helped saddle the city’s six licensed casino operators with an estimated combined loss for the second quarter of $478 million, according to a Bloomberg survey of analysts. In the Nevada desert, by contrast, business is booming as the US tries to live with the virus.

President Xi Jinping has reaffirmed China’s strict virus approach even though it looks increasingly unrealistic in the face of more transmissible variants. And while there’s technically a border between mainland China and Macau, the enclave must follow Xi’s rules. Its casinos, which account for 80% of government income and a third of employment, are mostly patronized by Chinese visitors, who may not return in pre-pandemic numbers for years—what Guotai Junan International Holdings Ltd. analyst Noah Hudson calls a “new normal” for the territory. “It could be that there will be no fundamental shift toward opening up or relaxation of pandemic controls in Macau,” Hudson says. “Cross-border restrictions would just rotate between more and less severe depending on the frequency of outbreaks.”