Macao Returns To Customs Clearance Full Moon: Leading Gambling Continues To Lose Money, "Dunhuang On The Sea" Waits For The Opportunity To Recover

Macao's tourism is no exception.

The busy streets of Jinguang Avenue are now a little strange. Venetians, melao Yinghui, Jinsha city center and other entertainment places are not as glorious as before. Guanye street is no longer "popular", and tourists carrying 89 shopping bags are not seen. This is a scene in Macao during the golden week of November this year.

On September 23, the State Administration of immigration officially announced the resumption of endorsement for mainland residents to visit Macao. It's a full moon today.

According to the data released by Macao tourism administration, a total of 58345 tourists visited Macao in the first three days of the National Day golden week, a decrease of 87.2% compared with previous years. Among them, 55089 people visited the mainland of Macao, which also decreased by 86.1% year on year.

However, the data also show that the total number of visitors to Macao from October 1 to 8 exceeded 156000, with 93.1% of them from the mainland. The number of tourists in Macao gradually rebounded in the late golden week and showed a gradual increase trend. The increase in the number of tourists has not only led to the recovery of Macao's tourism market, but also stabilized the confidence of many businesses in the tourism market. With the further opening of Macao tourism and the new development plan of Macao government, Macao tourism will gradually become diversified.

On October 22, Professor Wu Zhicai, director of the Guangdong tourism strategy and Policy Research Center of South China University of technology, told reporters of the 21st century economic report: "recently, the Ministry of culture and tourism of the people's Republic of China has issued regulations to temporarily suspend the entry-exit team tourism and machine wine business. There is no exit channel for mainland tourists who need to travel to Macao, and Macao's largest tourist market is the mainland. In addition, with the arrival of autumn and winter tourism off-season, these factors make the current tourism situation of Macao uncertain and uncertain, and the future development should wait for the opportunity. "

"Chopping hands battlefield" is rare

Sasa Sasa, Lailai supermarket and new eight hundred partners, which are usually popular with mainland tourists, have always been famous for their discount.

In the past, many tourists can see the pink bags of SA at the port of SA. These mainland tourists "chopping hands battlefield" are now less tourists. Macao's shopping malls offer different degrees of discount from imported snacks such as potato chips to tobacco, wine and famous watches.

"Duty free tobacco and wine is one of the most popular types of goods, with prices ranging from 20% to 30%. Supermarket shelves often use extra large red font to mark the discount range. Take 1000ml French Napoleonic wine as an example. The price is 30% off from HK $1700 to HK $1190. " Ms. Zhang (not her real name), who traveled to Macao from Guangzhou during the 11th National Day, told the 21st century economic reporter.

"Generally speaking, we go to buy some medicines, skin care products, cosmetics, specialty products and clothes. For example, Sasa and new eight hundred partners are places where we often go to purchase. Most of Macao's daily chemical products are produced abroad, and their prices are much cheaper than those of domestic exclusive stores, and there are often preferential discounts. " Luo from a university in Zhongshan said. In the past, she used to travel twice a year to Macau. Now, even though she has resumed her endorsement, she still says that she is not willing to go there.

Located in the hinterland of Guangdong Pearl River Delta, Macao tourism can attract many mainland tourists every year, among which college students are a group that can not be ignored. Zhuhai is close to Gongbei port, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Foshan, Zhongshan and other places, all within one hour of intercity.

A large group of college students will come to Macao every year to "buy and buy", browse the major scenic spots and boost the flow of people around. They even travel together and send shopping back to their families in northern cities.

"In the past, the circle of friends did not exaggerate. Every weekend, students and friends went to Macao to" punch in ", and it was easy to find someone to help them buy. Now, it is almost impossible to see people going to Macao." Luo said.

In addition to student groups, tourists who focus on luxury accessories, high-end restaurant consumption and high-end hotel accommodation are also the main force for its economic recovery.

In order to impress these groups with consumption power, the Macao SAR government has launched the plan of "expanding the source of tourists, invigorating the economy and ensuring employment". From September 1 to the end of December, consumption vouchers totalling 290 million yuan were issued through wechat platform to attract mainland tourists to Macao for tourism and consumption. In addition, Macao airlines and other businesses will provide passengers with air tickets, hotels and consumer preferences, which will be implemented in stages.

From a variety of "Hotel + scenic spot" package tickets to multiple discount promotions by catering and shopping merchants, many mainland tourists to Australia have gained a lot. On the major hotel reservation platforms, hotel prices can be seen everywhere, from 126 yuan for Broadway hotels in Macao and 228 cases in Macao's Melco shadow fair. Before the epidemic, such medium and high-end hotels were from 400 to 500 yuan.

Although the number of hotel orders has increased significantly since the end of October, many practitioners in the middle and lower reaches of the company have said that although the demand is increasing, the current number of individual visitors is not helpful to the suppliers, and the commission they get is relatively small from the perspective of the existing order volume.

"Dunhuang on the sea" to "gambling desert"

After more than 400 years of cultural integration between the East and the west, Macao has never been hurt by large-scale war, and retains the landscape and essence of Chinese and Western culture to the greatest extent. Therefore, Macao is known as "Dunhuang on the sea".

However, the new crown epidemic has brought unexpected impact to Macao's tourism industry, among which the gambling industry has suffered the most. During this period, the development of gambling in Macao has been seriously stagnated, and the number of tourists who want to "make a fortune and cross the sea" is also decreasing.

Mr. Chen (not his real name) from Guangzhou told the 21st century economic reporter that on the first day of Macao's reopening on September 23, he went to Macao from Gongbei port. Most of the people who passed the customs were export laborers, and the number of tourists they saw was very small. Compared with the crowd in the past, Venetians had few tourists. The waiters who helped to call taxis all lamented that they used to call a taxi It will come soon, but the number of waiting taxis is also decreasing due to the sharp decrease of tourists.

With the return of Macao in 1999, the Macao SAR government proposed to vigorously develop the gambling industry in view of the small land area and the difficulty in developing industry. Since 2006, Macao's gaming industry has surpassed Las Vegas in the United States for the first time, becoming a "world gambling city".

Since the handover, Macao's economy has continued to enter a stage of rapid growth. As the leading industry in Macao, the proportion of gambling tourism has also been increasing: from 23% in 1991 to about 50% at present, the situation of "one industry dominating" in gambling industry has not been improved, but intensified.

Bearing the vulnerability and huge risks, Macao tourism is doomed to "win or lose".

According to the data, Macao's gambling turnover in April this year was 754 million Macao dollars, down 96.4% from 23.625 billion yuan in the same period last year. However, in June, July and August, Macao's gaming revenue decreased by 97% / 94.5% / 94.5% respectively.

Earlier, the chairman of Macao Melco, Mr. Lawrence Ho, publicly announced that he would give up this year's salary and reduce the salary of the company's senior managers by 30%. He also said that the company will take some cost saving measures in view of the current economic situation. It is understood that nine senior executives of Melco have left voluntarily since March this year.

In July, Jinsha China announced the results of the second quarter of this year, with a net income of US $47 million (down 97.8% year-on-year). The adjusted EBITDA loss was US $310 million. Compared with the loss of US $166 million in the first quarter, the situation did not improve, but aggravated the "cold".

Although the performance has been severely damaged, even though it costs US $3 million (about Macao $23.9 million) to open the door one day, due to the huge amount of cash on account, the six major Bo enterprises can survive even if they have zero income for months to several years, and the practitioners in the industry are quite calm. This year, sands of Macau is gripping its teeth and continuing to invest. The new Londoner project is being transformed. The total investment is estimated to reach 17.5 billion Macao dollars. Sands group said that it is preparing for foreign tourists to continue to come to Macao to spend and gamble, and to receive guests with the best appearance.

Lianheng Qintong mainland, characteristic tourism "two plus"

Under the crisis of the epidemic situation, all parties have begun to seek a new way out.

In fact, for a long time, Macao's economy and tourism rely on the mainland and Hong Kong markets, accounting for about 80% of the total. In the future, Macao's tourism should strengthen its efforts to explore the source of tourists from other regions, build a new tourism city, and help Macao's economic diversification.

Compared with many famous tourist resorts in the west, such as Monaco, the Pearl of the Middle East and so on, Macao also has luxury hotels, convenient transportation and characteristic cultural landscape, but there are still many gaps.

It is obvious that with the further development of Macao, Macao will become an international tourism center.

Macao and Hengqin are separated by a river, and their relations become closer. Wu Zhicai also pointed out that in the future, Hengqin and Macao will gradually realize integration, with Hengqin as the bridgehead to connect Macao and the mainland. At present, the customs clearance between the two places has been approved by the State Council, and the customs clearance mode of "cooperative inspection and one-time release" has been approved by the State Council. In the future, with the link between Hengqin and Macao light rail, the exchanges between the two places will be closer.

In addition, Macao has also cooperated with Hengqin in the traditional Chinese medicine industry to explore a diversified economy. In April 2011, the Guangdong Macao cooperative traditional Chinese medicine science and Technology Industrial Park has been officially established in Hengqin. Through the regional cooperation between Hengqin and Macao, the industrial park will make preparations for large-scale production in the international market by utilizing the achievements of small-scale transformation of traditional Chinese medicine industry.

Wu Zhicai told the 21st century economic reporter that the third direction of Macao's development in the future is also the direction with unique potential. It is the "yacht free travel in Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macao" that has been proposed many years ago.

"At present, there are many aspects of yacht free travel that have not been well constructed. But in the future, if we want to realize the integration of marine transportation in Dawan District, it will be a very big consumption potential. In the future, the yacht free guilds in the Great Bay area of Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macao will become a whole. Yacht docks in many coastal cities such as the Pearl River, Xijiang River, Dongjiang River and Beijiang River will be able to set up water transportation lines for tourism, leisure and vacation in Macao. " Wu Zhicai said.

Although it has entered the late autumn season in November, the current momentum of Macao's tourism industry is still "warming up". The industry is generally optimistic about the recovery of Macao's tourism, but believes that the process will be relatively slow. Gao Kaixian, President of the Chinese General Chamber of Commerce in Macao, once said that this year's outbreak of new crown pneumonia has brought severe challenges and challenges to the government of the Macao Special Administrative Region and all walks of life in Macao. In the future, it will increase cultural and sports events according to Macao's development status and industrial development needs, and make use of Macao's cultural resources of blending Chinese and Western cultures to publicize Macao's non gambling elements to tourists from all over the world, so as to help Macao Economic recovery.

Wu Zhicai believes that at present, Macao is also actively developing the "two ends plus" tourism mode. The two ends of tourism, namely, take tourism as a strategic platform, create more modes of tourism + exhibition, tourism + sports, tourism + culture, etc., and do more integration to form a tourism ecosystem, and turn small Macao into a big tourism. In the future, in addition to gambling and shopping, there will also be more sports competitions and cultural exhibitions in Macao to build a diversified consumption system. (Editor: Cao Jinliang)