The Philippine gaming sector – including non-casino operations – produced gross gaming revenue (GGR) of PHP89.23 billion (US$1.56 billion) in the three months to June 30, up 32.3 percent from the prior-year quarter.
The tally was up 9.2 percent sequentially, said the country’s casino regulator, the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp (Pagcor), in a Sunday announcement. It marked a new quarterly record in terms of industry-wide GGR.
The agency said the electronically-delivered games segment remained the industry’s best performer in terms of growth during the period, reaching PHP30.85 billion in the second quarter.
Alejandro Tengco (pictured), chairman and chief executive of Pagcor, was quoted in the release as saying the e-Games segment “recorded an impressive 525-percent increase” from the prior-year period.
“This sector continues to surpass targets and should help cover up for any shortfall resulting from the [Philippines] President’s order banning offshore gaming operations … by the end of the year,” stated Mr Tengco.
In a recent written reply to GGRAsia, Pagcor said that financially, the decision to ban offshore online gaming operators would have “a minimal impact on the Philippine gaming industry since the segment accounts for less than 5 percent of [aggregate] gross gaming revenue”.
The country’s licensed commercial-sector casinos remained the “biggest contributor” to second-quarter GGR, at PHP49.5 billion. The figure was down 4.3 percent year-on-year, and flat sequentially, according to Sunday’s release.
Pagcor-operated casinos – under its network of Casino Filipino venues – brought in PHP4.20 billion in GGR in the April to June period, 14.8-percent lower from a year earlier, and down 10.4 percent quarter-on-quarter.
Pagcor expects the nation’s gaming industry to generate PHP336.38 billion in GGR this year, a 17.9-percent increase compared with 2023. The first-half aggregate represented 50.8 percent of the agency’s target.
In July, state-run Pagcor reported net income of PHP6.56 billion for the first half of 2024, up 121.5 percent from the prior-year period.