Visitors spent a grand total of 20.35 billion patacas during the first three months of the year – excluding gambling expenditure at the city’s casinos, according to the latest data from the Statistics and Census Service (known by its Portuguese initials DSEC).
On a per capita basis, the amount spent by people attending performances or sporting fixtures in the SAR more than doubled when compared to what they spent across the first quarter of 2023. The increase could indicate progress in the government’s efforts to transform Macao into a “City of Sports and Shows.”
Spending by those in the SAR for MICE events, another target sector, was up by 18.2 percent.
[See more: Macao needs more hotel rooms to grow its MICE sector, delegates told]
Overall, visitor spending increased by 35.9 percent when compared with the first quarter of last year, when Macao was reopening after the Covid-19 pandemic. It was up by 20.2 percent when compared with the same period in 2019, the last full year before the pandemic decimated tourism.
While per capita spending was up 40 percent when compared with 2019, it was down by almost a quarter year-on-year. DSEC put the drop down to “visitors’ pent-up demand” being released back in 2023 – meaning travellers were willing to spend more than they usually would then, after three years’ of little opportunity.
By origin, mainland Chinese spent more than twice as much as Hong Kongers on a per capita basis in the first quarter of this year: 2,665 patacas versus 1,071 patacas. Tourists from Singapore, South Korea and Thailand spent similar amounts as visitors from the mainland, while those from Japan and Malaysia spent a little less than 2,000 patacas each.
