Melco Crown Entertainment said Thursday that its second-quarter net revenue dropped seven percent year-on-year to US$1.19 billion
“The decline in net revenue was primarily attributable to lower group-wide rolling chip revenues, partially offset by improved mass-market table games revenues,” the company said in a statement.
VIP gamblers use so-called rolling chips which can’t be cashed directly for cash.
Adjusted property EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation) dropped 10.6 percent to US$313.6 million in the second quarter. The statement said the EBITDA decline “was attributable to lower group-wide rolling chip volumes and rolling chip win rate, partially offset by growth in the mass-market table games segment.”
Net income attributable to the company for the second quarter was US$143.6 million, down 20.7 percent year-on-year.
The company’s US$17 million net loss attributable to non-controlling interests during the second quarter “related to Studio City [in Cotai] and City of Dreams Manila,” the statement said.
The statement quoted Lawrence Ho Yau Lung, the company’s co-chairman and CEO, as saying that “in the second quarter of 2013 we delivered solid underlying financial performance, driving primarily by our mass-market table games business at City of Dreams where revenues increased approximately 38 percent on a year-over-year basis.”
Ho also said that the company’s board of directors “has approved the implementation of a US$500 million stock repurchase programme …., we believe this capital management strategy provides us with the mechanism to return surplus capital opportunistically and efficiently, while maintaining flexibility to fund our current operations and future development pipeline.
”(macaunew/macaupost)
