Kangwon Land, the only casino in South Korea that allows locals to freely released its figures for the financial year 2019 on Tuesday.
Specifically and in particular, the report breakdown shows that Kangwon Land’s recorded a double-digit profit in 2019, thanks to a blissful last quarter of the year.
In the Q4 of 2019, Kangwon Land’s revenue totaled to $332.7 million, which was a 6% rise from the same period in 2018. In the same quarter, profits more than doubled as margins went up from 5.4% the previous year to 14.2% in 2019.
Not a single gaming vertical can be pinpointed for the increased revenue in the last quarter. All games seemed to be doing very well, with each recording an increased revenue. The gaming website, CalvinAyre.com just gave a detailed report on the numbers released. The mass-market tables went up 3.7% while the VIP table rose by 6.2%. The VIP slots revenue also recorded an increment of 10.4%.
However, all the three gaming verticals recorded a pretty notable decline of nearly 6% from Q3. Despite this, the earnings in Q4 were adequate enough to push 2019 full year’s revenue up by 5.7%. The operating income for the year 2019 also rose by 16.6% to KRW502b while the net profit went up 12.7% to KRW335b.
It seems 2019 did not only favor Kangwon Land. Grand Korea Leisure, a South Korea gaming operator which runs three Seven Luck-branded gaming venues, also recorded boosted income in the last quarter of 2019.
Revenue in Q4 went up by 17% to KRW130.8b while profits surged through the roof by 167.5% to KRW18.3%. This came as one big surprise to the experts that analyzed the company’s records and financial books. And the major reason is that it happened completely unexpectedly. However, despite the revenue in 2019 rising by 2.2%, the annual profit went down by 6.9% to KRW72.4b. In a press statement last week, GKL reported that it had started 2020 on a promising note.
At the beginning of the year, a coronavirus epidemic struck the mainland of China. To protect their citizens, authorities from neighboring countries have imposed travel restrictions on citizens of China. The government of South Korea has prohibited anyone from the Hubei province of China, where the virus began, from gaining access to the country. Casinos that operate on a foreigner-only basis are most struck by the travel ban, as most of their customers are from China. Already, most of these casinos have banned tour groups from China in a bid to protect their guests.
The current coronavirus situation gives an upper hand to Kangwon Land over its foreigner’s only rivals. In a statement, GKL said that they cannot predict how much damage the travel ban has had on their numbers, as it was implemented mid-month. They are waiting for the end of February numbers to be released so they can know where they stand in the current crisis.
