Macau retailers still cautious, despite better sales

While retail outlets and dining establishments had better year-on-year sales in May, Macau retailers are still cautious about their business prospects, says the Macau Statistics and Census Service (DSEC).

For its monthly business climate survey, the DSEC interviewed 167 dining enterprises that account for 53 per cent of the industry’s receipts, and 135 retailers that account for 70 per cent of trade.

Despite their caution, 26 per cent of retailers expect a year-on-year increase in sales, up three points from May, while 38 per cent are less optimistic. During May, 36 per cent of the retail respondents indicated a year-on-year sales decline, a drop of two points.

Experiencing better-than-expected results were adults’ clothing retailers and supermarkets, which exceeded forecasts by 40 and 33 points respectively.

For June, 80 per cent of the respondents in the leather-goods area expect improved sales with all respondents having year-on-year increases in May.

Watches, clocks and jewellery retailers had a 24-point rise in expectations for June, hitting 50 per cent, while department stores predict a 22-point increase to 56 per cent.

Restaurants had a six-point drop from the previous month in the percentage of respondents reporting year-on-year growth, while those who had a year-on-year decline rose 10 points to 33 per cent.

DSEC says the results were better than expected, as the April survey indicated only 18 per cent of respondents expected better sales figures.

Expectations for last month are mainly pessimistic with 41 per cent of respondents expecting receipts to dip while while only 22 per cent expect a rise. Predicting increases are 27 per cent of Chinese restaurants, 25 per cent of Western restaurants and 18.8 per cent of Japanese and Korean restaurants.

On the other hand, 60 per cent of Western restaurants foresee a drop.