Right, good afternoon. I'm Richard Clarke. I'm the Global Hotels and Leisure Analyst here at Bernstein. Delighted to have Rob Goldstein, the CEO of Sands with us today. Thanks for joining us today. Always great to talk to you. Let's maybe just start with the, you know, uncertain macro world we find ourselves with, and then we'll get a little bit more onto your long-term strategy.
What is really uncertain? What's the macro?
I mean, I guess if we look at your share price, much like most of the stocks I look at, you kind of, you know, round trip, $42 down to $32, back up, you know, to $42 again. You know, has that reflected what you've seen internally? You know, did you see turmoil around the initial imposition of tariffs, and has that begun to ease off, or is it sort of overstated the amount of volatility you were seeing within the business?
I'm not sure tariffs are that critical right now to our stock price. I think the market has been soft since COVID. It never made the rebound, the same way the U.S. did. There's no, there's a different mentality in China in terms of, post-COVID. I'm not sure that tariffs doesn't help us, obviously. It's negative, but, it doesn't help the Chinese market. I think it's, many other factors. Post-COVID, we've been in a very different place in Macau than pre-COVID, and, a different world over there, much more uncertain and much different in terms of incentives. It's been a market we've struggled with a bit, and we opened Londoner, in full a few months ago, so hopefully that'll help our business. No, I wouldn't think tariffs have been the reason our stock has gone down.
There's obviously just lots of concern about the U.S.-China relationship, and China in general as a consumer market has been struggling. Again, we have faith long-term that China and Macau will do quite well, but it's been a very challenging couple of years, not just during the Trump tariff era.
Okay. No, it makes sense. Maybe just, you sort of the element of deglobalization risk, maybe if you can just talk to that. You're a US-listed firm operating primarily in Asia. You know, do you see any chance?
I'm primarily 100% in Asia.
100%. Sorry. 100%.
Primarily, we are a Singapore and a Macau-driven business.
Singapore and business.
And.
Do you see any risks associated with that, that relationship, or do you think that you're seen as a local business?
You mean from a China perspective or how the investors view us?
Yeah.
No, I think it, I mean, we'd love to be in the U.S. at some point. We would have tried and failed. I don't think there's much risk associated with not being, having a business here. We had a, obviously, we built and started in Las Vegas, 30 years ago with the Venetian. Sold that to Apollo and VICI a while back. No, I don't think there's any real risk to not being in the U.S. It'd be nice to be here from a different, from a, as a U.S. citizen, it'd be nice to be in the U.S. again.
What about the sort of side? Do you see any sense of kind of an anti-U.S. sentiment weighing on your business within Macau or Singapore?
I've not, I've not. I think we have been very fortunate. We've always been treated well by the Macau government and by Beijing. I don't sense that. Is there a U.S. anti-U.S. sentiment in Europe? I was in Europe. I felt it very strongly. A number of people made comments, but I've never seen it in Beijing or Macau affecting it or Singapore.
Okay.
I think more about just more uncertainty what, where we're going as a country and who we are in the world. I think there's more uncertainty about the U.S. than anything else. Hasn't impacted our business at this point. No.
Okay. Let's dial in on Macau, and I'm gonna swing back to Singapore. You know, you mentioned it earlier, you know, visitation levels still down, you know, where we were in 2019. You know, is that macro? Is there anything structural going on there? You know, what's your sort of optimism that things can get better in terms of?
Actually, visitation in Macau actually is pretty good. In fact, it has recovered. The problem is the spend is different than it used to be.
Okay. Sorry.
Yeah. The visitation used to be equivalent to the spend, but that's, they've decoupled now, and visitation can be pretty good, but the spend isn't. The market's kind of, it had a nice rebound there, post-COVID, 2015- 2018, and then to 2022, and then it's kind of peaked at 2027, 2028. Right now it appears to be flat at that number. We'll see how May comes out, but there's not, I had a false belief a couple of years ago that Macau would just keep moving up into the 30s and beyond. I think it's a couple of factors. It's consumer sentiment, obviously there's global economic issues, the tariffs don't help, but it's also just, there's other factors we can't determine how much is tied to online gambling in Asia.
It is, for whatever reason you wanna assign to it, Macau has definitely stalled out, and it is not where it was, obviously, pre-COVID. The demise of the junket segment did not help, and the competition is fierce there. I think long-term, I still believe Macau will be in the $32 billion and eventually $34 billion, but it is not happening imminently. It is not happening today or tomorrow. We are kind of struggling in Macau with the fact visitation has recovered, but spend has not.
Just the, you know, your thoughts around the recent holiday travel in, in China, like Golden Week.
Yeah, it was a very powerful May is gonna be, I think, I haven't seen numbers obviously now out yet, but I assume May will be a very positive outcome for the GGR in Macau should look very good, I think, up, up a single digit, but up. Clearly we saw a strong Golden Week, the whole market. You saw the numbers come out. Visitation, spend, it was a very power in, in light of what's happening in the world, I thought, May is a pleasant surprise, and Golden Week was very strong for the whole industry.
Is that a sign that things are getting better?
Yeah. I don't know. It ebbs and flows. What the Tuesday looks better, and Friday looks worse, and there's no consistency. Again, I plead guilty to believing the market would have been a steady ascent into the $32 billion and $34 billion GGR range, and it hasn't. I was wrong. I think it will. I think, inevitably, the power of the Chinese markets, it just, it's the most powerful market land-based in the world. It will recover. I think it's actually pretty impressive in light of the economic numbers coming out of China, retail, and other businesses, how well Macau's held up in this rather difficult time. Look at the retail numbers, luxury, and other, they're pretty soft. I'm hoping for a better day, and we've gotta do better within the parameters of the market today.
We've not done as well as we could've done competitively, and our last quarter was disappointing. We are hoping for improvement in our operating philosophy and our operating approach to accelerate our own EBITDA within the confines of today's Macau market, which is not the frothy, you know, go-go market it was pre-COVID.
In terms of sort of regional breakdown there, is the weakness coming from all over China? Is the sort of the neighboring provinces stronger? You know, high-end versus low-end, the sort of VIP is softer?
I don't think you can break it out that way. The market's changed. The demise of the junket segment certainly drove more people into the non-rolling premium mass segment, but I think the weakness in the base mass has also impacted it. I don't think it's regional as much as just China is just in a different place than it was in 2019, and the business of Macau's in a different place than it was. It's a myriad of factors, but the aggregate result is a more challenging market to operate in.
What about Macau as attracting visitors from outside of China? Like, is that an opportunity? I guess it's been.
Sure.
Primarily a Chinese market for you, but is there.
Yeah.
Is there a way to promote that to the wider world?
You know, when you visit, I've been all over Asia. I've never seen a place as, I think, compelling for the Asian customer as Macau's. It really is. Sheldon once says, it should be Las Vegas. I think it's morphed into that. It's an amazing place with great accommodations, great food, entertainment. It has the whole package, but it has not been as attractive to non-Chinese visitors as the government would like. I think that's a cultural issue. I think it's also just a China issue. I think inevitably Macau is just too potent and too desirable not to increase and grow its audience in the years ahead. I think it will become more powerful for the international visitor. I believe 100% Macau will get stronger and stronger, you know, for Japanese, Korean, Indonesian, Malaysian. It should. It should be.
Like Singapore, it should be much more attractive, but there have been impediments. I think the airport now being accessible by the road makes a lot of sense. In the old days the ferry was difficult, but it has not grown as fast as I think it could and it will.
Okay. Wonderful. Maybe let's talk about, you know, it's a, it's a softer market, but you've been investing. You know, you're making considerable amounts of capital investments into Macau.
Yeah.
What kind of returns are you expecting on those? Those are completed now, is that right? And what kind of.
London is fully open. We never stop in, I mean, Macau's like the old Brooklyn Bridge joke. It means you're painting all the time. You start and you stop.
Yep.
We're constantly doing R&M on the Venetian now and the Parisian. The Four Seasons is done. The Londoner is done, but we're constantly investing. We believe in Macau long-term. We believe in an asset-based strategy, which has not performed as well as we hoped it would, but we do believe long-term that in the end, great buildings drive returns and will be rewarded for the investments we made. We're the biggest investor in Macau. We've not been rewarded with the returns I'd like to see. I'd like to see us do a lot better. I think Londoner will do very well. I think this quarter we'll see some good results out of Londoner, but we still remain believers in investing in quality and scale, and that will never change. Singapore the same way.
We just have to wait for a better day in Macau and also help ourselves by performing better, by operating better. I'm going over, I think, 10 days now. I'm in Macau, and the whole week is about how we increase our visibility, our positioning, our incentives to drive more EBITDA into our buildings in Macau 'cause we've been outperformed by other people.
Okay. And then hotel capacity in, in Macau still is?
Strong. Very strong. It's not about filling rooms and there's no trick to filling rooms capacity-wise. It's about quality of customer in the room. You can sell every room in Macau. It's not an issue. It's getting the right people. Let's face it, it's still driven by gambling, not by ADR or by hotel rate. It's driven by the right gamblers in the market, and I think we've got to work harder and make sure that mix is more favorable to our results where we want them to get to.
Is there scope to add more properties in Macau? Is it over in, I might be pronouncing this wrong, but Hengqin?
Hengqin. Yeah. The government's made this, I do not think you'll see gaming properties in Hengqin. I think you might see more hotel properties. There is obviously more room in Macau. There's still the old site adjacent to The Londoner, which is vacant. If the government wants to add capacity, it could, but in this market, I do not think they'll opt for that. It's not the right time. They would like to opt for more non-gaming, you know, hotel-based facilities. That would make great sense, but I do not see gaming hotels opening in Macau anytime soon.
Is non-gaming of any interest to you at all?
Yeah. Yeah. No. We need more. Everybody needs, well, it works in tandem, does it not? Non-gaming brings gaming. When you have sleeping rooms, they bring gamblers, and they bring more people to retail and to food and beverage, entertainment. Absolutely, non-gaming is essential to drive the gaming business, and the demand for Macau is there. The supply is too small. Las Vegas has what, 160,000 rooms or so, and Macau is much, 25%-30% of that. It could use more sleeping rooms because it has the biggest market in the world. It has China at its doorstep with a billion-plus, billion three.
No question in my mind that more, if you had more sleeping rooms in Macau of every, of every type, it can be base mass, it could be high-end, super high, every type of room is valuable to driving more gaming revenue. Sure.
Would you ever see an opportunity in mainland China?
We've looked in, it's not a call for I came in here about something we're looking at doing in mainland China investment. Obviously not a gaming investment. It'd be more strategic, and we've always looked at China as maybe. Hard to find the right thing though that fits in with what we do and be, and could be helpful to our Macau properties. Hard to, it's, it's not easy.
Just got a question here from the audience, but, obviously kind of calling back to Vegas, where profits have increasingly come from non-gaming.
Yeah.
Activity.
Yeah.
Is that something you expect to take place in Macau as well?
Macau always has been very strong non-gaming. The retail revenue there is astounding. Our mall business, not recently with what's happened in retail in general, but typically our non-gaming business in Macau is extraordinary. It's probably over $1 billion of EBITDA between retail, restaurant, and hotel occupancy. It's a huge business, just like Las Vegas. The difference is Las Vegas was gaming-centric and then became a non-gaming market, with the advent of higher room rates and the realization that we started 30 years ago, and Sheldon first prophesized that there'd be a convention-based non-gaming value. People fell down laughing at us. We opened the Venetian in 1999, and room rates skyrocketed. I actually was accused once, "You're not really in the gaming business. You're in the hotel business." I almost went to jail for that in Las Vegas.
The truth is Macau and Las Vegas deserve high occupancy, high rate because they offer a product which is, it can't be replicated. They'll never be in Las Vegas. They'll never be in Macau. You can't, the $50 billion-$60 billion-$70 billion that's been invested in Macau in the last 20 years is unbelievable. Vegas has become, you know, a juggernaut of investment, and it's a one-of-a-kind place. Like it or not, you may like Las Vegas, may not like it, but it's one of a kind. It's a unique property, unique place. Macau is very similar. It's just smaller in terms of scale, but newer. Macau's very impressive. Where it started from back in the 1990s to where it's at today, it's an amazing progression of quality and quantity.
Just, another question from the audience here. What would need to happen for spend per visit to recover?
I think it's the brightest lights you've ever seen. I think I'm gonna.
That's my second one in this room.
They're gonna ask me where I was on Friday night when the guy got killed.
We wanna.
It's so unbelievable.
We're trying to interrogate you.
I know. I've never seen it.
I know.
Yeah. I always like one of those movies. Like, I'm sorry. The question was?
It's probably helpful. I can look at you. You have to look at the audience. What would, what would need to happen for spend per visit to recover? Is it purely just in Macau?
In Macau, yeah. Oh, I think it's a better economy would help it, a better confidence level. I mean, the world's in an awkward place, I think, right now. There's confusion about the bilateral relationship, China and the U.S. There's confusion about the tariffs. There's confusion about China's trajectory. I mean, it's not an easy place to navigate, and I think a lot of consumers here in the U.S. and in China are baffled or concerned. What is the trajectory of these countries and what's gonna happen? I believe if you don't have a relationship with China and the U.S. working together, the world economy suffers. We all suffer. This ridiculous idea that we're gonna make, you know, we're gonna exist on our own is insane. I mean, we've got, we've gotta have trade.
We've gotta have a relationship with China, and we have a relationship with the world. I mean, we're not, you know, it can't be America only or China only. I think the world's kind of watching, waiting, concerned. You see it in equity prices. You see it in people's consumer confidence. You see it in their spending habits. I was with a friend of mine who owns a lot of retail here in New York. It's tough. I think until people get more of a certainty of what tomorrow's gonna bring, and it was going pretty well until this whole, you know, it's painful to watch the U.S.-China relationship not be stronger.
It needs to be stronger for all of our benefit, not just this country, not just China, but Europe and the rest of the world benefits when China and the U.S. work things out together, and hopefully there can be resolution. President Trump and President Xi can figure that out.
Very clear. Right. Now I'm gonna ask you all the same questions again about.
Okay.
Singapore. well.
Singapore is very different.
Yeah. Maybe let's set the scene then. Tell us where we are in Singapore.
We're in a, look, life is cycles, and those that live long enough know things change all the time. Singapore is in a wonderful place where it's all going very well, and it's going well for a lot of reasons. One, I think, it's probably become that magical city, place in Asia that attracts a very high-spend, high-frequent person from all over Asia, whether it's Indonesia, Malaysia, Korea, you know, China. We're getting all kinds of people in Singapore. It's very desirable. There's a lot of private wealth gravitating to Singapore. I mean, the price per sq ft in real estate there is astronomical. The market is hot as a pistol. To be honest, we have a duopoly, but we have the best of it, as you can see from the lopsided EBITDAs we're making there versus our competitor.
Our competitors, they're great people, and they've done some nice things, but they've not achieved the kind of EBITDA s we have. I think our last quarter was in excess of $600 million. I expect to see more of that in the future, $600 million, maybe $700 million in the future. Our business in Singapore is powerful, and it's not based on a multi-segment. It's based on a very top-tier luxury segment of customer. It's a small hotel. We've downsized the room count to focus on the super high-end, and it's the numbers there, even the retail numbers in light of a difficult retail environment, are very strong. The gaming's very strong. Our base mass, our slot businesses probably make $1 billion top line this year, which is astounding. Singapore isn't a privileged place, and I don't think it gets, it goes nowhere but up at this point unless something terrible happens.
It seems like it's the shining market in all of Asia, attracting the wealthiest, and the country and the government have been exemplary. I mean, they're great to deal with, and we break ground on there. I think in July we break ground number two, which will be open probably sometime in the early part of the 2030s. Singapore is, I wish y'all were here to see it. We built Singapore for $5.8 billion, and the guessing was could do $300 million, $500 million, $1 billion. The fact it probably will get to a $2.5 billion run rate this decade is astounding. The post-COVID trajectory of GGR in that market is astounding. Our business is terrific, and we're thrilled to be there.
Obviously, you know, $600 million of EBITDA from one property.
Yeah.
Pretty extraordinary in the hotel world. You're adding a second property.
Yeah.
Obviously, you mentioned it there. Maybe just give us some details. It's not quite Marina.
No, no.
Make sense too, is it? It's a little bit more modest.
It just costs more. It's a very, well, it's very extravagant. My friend's hotel business always laughs at the cost per key. It's only 550 keys. It's costing somewhere in the $8 billion range. I know it sounds, you know, very expensive 'cause it is, but I also think the market there will pay for that kind of product. We're, again, targeting an uber-upscale audience that gets to Singapore and wants to be in Singapore. It's a very seductive place for a lot of reasons, and we have total confidence in it being a very successful project. Again, it's not gonna open for probably five, six years.
maybe just the question again about, you know, the non-gaming revenue.
Yeah.
In Singapore.
Yeah.
Is there, is there faster growth? Is there more opportunities to drive that?
There's higher spend per room. There's higher spend per square foot retail. Singapore is just the home of, you know, whether it's retail, restaurants, entertainment, everything price is higher. I just bought a room for somebody as a, as a gift, and I, when I got the bill, I was astounded in Singapore how much it cost, for our base room. The fact is Singapore is, is for affluent people. They can afford it, whether it's the gaming product, the hotel product, the retail, the food and beer, everything's expensive, but it's, I think it's well received and people think it's worth it. Again, we shrunk the key count to be more focused on a very specific customer, and it's paid off very, very well. Our strategy in Singapore looks very good.
Not as good as what we, obviously, we're not as happy as our numbers in Macau, but Singapore has been an unqualified success the last couple of years, and I think it just gets better.
One of the trends we've seen in Singapore is this side bet, surveillance of side bets.
Yeah.
You know, what is the sort of upside opportunity from that? Maybe you can sort of talk about where that came from.
Yeah. So gambling, people do not understand side bets. They get very emotional about what it means. It is very simple. They are just higher risk to the customer and higher reward to the house. We have always been a proponent in making side bets in the box, we are a baccarat company. Dan Briggs always calls us the ABC, the Asian baccarat company, which I love that because I think it is mostly true. We have a lot of hotel rooms and restaurants and retail and all that, but in the end, what drives our company's success or failure is baccarat. So the baccarat game, as you may or may not know, has for years been a rather boring, you know, 2.7%, 2.8% house advantage. If you are flat betting, house advantage is minuscule if you are flat betting banker player. The minute you add derivatives, side bets, they are bad bets for the customer.
Let's call it what it is. They're high, they're high reward if you hit one, but they're high risk. My father-in-law played the lottery every day for about 2,000 years. I don't know if he ever won, but I don't think so. He never told me he did. I think these bets are akin to, you know, they're prop bets. You watch the Super Bowl and you can bet, you know, one team or the other. That's fine, but if you bet the prop bets, sports betting today is a bad bet for the companies, for DraftKings, Flutter, etc. The flat bets, when you bet the Cubs versus the Phillies, not very exciting for the house. The money's in the side bets. That's true of any industry, in gambling.
What we're trying to do in Macau and Singapore is create more prop bets, side bets that people may gravitate to. It's higher house advantage. It's very important to driving that. When you're doing the billions of dollars of money we take in from revenue from baccarat, if we can drive the per from, let's say, it was 2.7, 2.8 for years, now it's at 3.5, 3.6. Prop bets are wonderful. I remember being a young guy in Atlantic City a thousand years ago, and I worked for a guy who was a finance person that didn't understand gambling at all. We had a customer who wanted to bet the tie in those days in Atlantic City. The tie was, he wanted about $100,000, and the guy I worked for panicked. He said, "Rob, you can't $100,000. It's crazy.
You never go." I said, "You should take all that you can get because it's such a stupid bet. If he's dumb enough to make it, take all you can take." He said, "What's the customer think?" I said, "That's the customer. He's hearing me. I'm telling him it's a dumb bet. If he wants to make the bet, it's up to him, not you. Take the bet." The prop bets are like that. They're very advantageous to the house, not for the customer. We're trying to find ways of, and the whole industry's doing this. They're trying to find people that, we've heard all kinds of different games, side bets, you know, different names. In the end, it's about giving the customers something they want and want to bet on that adds more advantage to the house.
Right now, you saw last month we announced Singapore is up to 3.7% hold. If that hold keeps going, the value to us is incalculable because nothing changes. The CapEx does not change. The dealers do not change. The costs remain the same, but the house advantage drives your winnings and your flow through, and the EBITDA is considerable. Also, this is enhanced by the smart tables, which have taken over the industry. And rightfully so, the smart tables give you multiple advantages. They give you great security. They also give you the fact you know exactly what the customer's betting. Imagine if you know your customer's habits to the point where, you know, it is now done for you, not a pit boss or a foreman writing it down. If he has a bad day and you pay attention, you lose the bet.
This way, you know exactly what the customer's wagering, and you can then calculate the value to you based on his wagers. A flat better is not nearly as valuable as a side better. Same in sports betting, same in anything. I think the smart tables have been hugely advantageous, but also enable us to offer more side wagers. They can make the felt change, and the side betting is enhanced by having smart tables. The advantages, I think, for baccarat is over the time we've been experimenting with it, we've driven the power up, but the fact is it could get as high as 4+%, which would be astronomical for a company like ours. That's a real hidden value of our company because, again, we are the ABC company.
Why is this an opportunity in Singapore but doesn't seem to be as much of an opportunity in Macau?
It's equal. It's Singapore, it started there a little earlier because the regulatory environment allows us to do things there and try it. It doesn't matter to me. Singapore, Macau, even Las Vegas, the customer dictates what they want to bet. You make the offer and let the customer tell you. You're gonna see side betting in Macau become very important. It's very important in Singapore, but the markets to me are very similar. I know people think there's different habits or, I, I don't believe, but I think in the end, a gambler given the option to gamble will pick, look at the table and make his own decision. In the end, Macau and Singapore are very similar in terms of appetite for side wagers.
What synergies do you see between being in the two locations? Like how many cross guests do you have across the two locations?
We have a lot, but we don't really, because of the way the laws are set up in Macau, we don't cross-market as much as you'd think. We're not able to share information and data. We're very careful to isolate Macau, at the request of the government. The cross-marketing isn't important. I've also believed that's overstated in terms of, the customers are intelligent. They know where to go, where they want to go, and most mainlanders will choose Macau over Singapore, but the greater Asia region will choose Singapore over Macau.
Okay. That makes sense. You mentioned earlier in Singapore you're doing better than competition. In Macau, maybe more recently, you've seen the competition do better than you.
Yes.
What determines who's winning there? What are they doing better or what are you doing better? What's the, you know?
I mean, to me.
As a result, what are they actively?
What determines that? I look at the EBITDA numbers and I get, it bothers me when I'm not doing as well in Macau as we could. In the end, what drives it in Macau has always been a market predicated on product, on rooms and quality and food and this. The gambling has always just, you know, the product drove the revenue. What's happened is it's become a much more incentive-driven market and much more direct incentives to the customer, which we've not played that game as well as others have. My hat's off to them. I'm not here to, I'm here to say they're right and we're wrong. We need to be more aggressive. It may cost us the margin, but we don't, margin, no one at the bank asks for the margin. They ask how much money you have.
If we make more EBITDA, we'll be happier than making higher margins. We gotta rethink who we are and respect our assets, but also respect the customer is being sought after by many different entities, and you've gotta compete and you've gotta be market sensitive. Frankly, we haven't been. We haven't been good enough. Our Macau numbers are disappointing to me. As good as Singapore is, Macau should be doing better. If Macau was doing what it should be doing, we'd be in a $5.5 billion of cumulative EBITDA, which would put us where we want to be.
Maybe just to square those comments. You're saying that the quality of the product is mattering a little bit less in Macau, but you're investing in upgrading your product.
We're always gonna upgrade, but I think we've not gotten the payoff that I expected. I was wrong. I thought people would, the product would drive it. What's driving it is product's important, but equally important today is incentives against the customer, direct incentives, cash and discounting and things like that, which are not margin positive, but they're EBITDA positive if you do them right. Look, you can weave that back thinking this would change, and we were wrong. I was wrong. We can pontificate about what people, how they should run their business, but if they're making more money than you, then shame on you. Get in the game and stop complaining, and that's what we need to do.
We need to be more, more aggressive in Macau, make more money, and that's our, that's our driving force in our company, or it has been. You know, no one pays you for margin. No one pays you for pretty buildings. They do not produce EBITDA.
Fair enough. Maybe just a comment on, you know, which products are resonating at the moment. You've got a kind of range of branded products, very, very high-end.
Yeah.
Sort of exclusive products. You've got some themed products, I think it would be fair to say.
Yeah.
Obviously, in Macau, you've kind of gone down the route of just high-end luxury. What is the product that kind of most resonates? Is that very different between the two?
I think you can do theming in a luxury. I mean, the Londoner is the embodiment of both. It's a themed, heavily themed product. I mean, you can't deny you call it the Londoner, you're kind of in the theme business, aren't you? I think we've also done a great job executing on multiple levels of hotel excellence, and it's a bizarrely good product. It's as good as it gets. I think, whereas Singapore is much more of a non-themed, architectural icon-type product, which is also non-themed but very luxurious. The Four Seasons in Macau is same thing, non-themed, uber luxurious. Our mainstay has always been the Venetian, which is heavily themed. Some would say it's, you know, theming is a negative thing. It depends what market you're in.
It worked very well, but we've invested, I think, $2.7 billion or $2.8 billion in Macau in 2007 to open The Londoner. I mean, The Venetian has made, I don't know, tens of millions of dollars since that, tens of billions. Clearly, theming works in some markets, and it depends what you're, you know, in Vegas, the 1990s theme was essential. Sheldon and I once went to a dinner with a bunch of investors, and some guy said, "What's your theme gonna be in Las Vegas, Mr. Adelson?" "My theme is making money," he said. "I'm in the money-making theme. And whatever goddamn thing it takes to make money, I'll do that." It was very funny. The guy got very offended. He said, "Well, he's very coarse." I said, "Oh, you haven't seen coarse. That's nothing.
That's an appetizer." He's a tough guy, but he was right. He said, "The theme will work." We landed on Venetian 'cause we felt at that time that probably 99% of Americans didn't have a passport or had been to Venice. We created this make-believe fantasy of what Venice was. It was beautiful, and it was a great success. There were those who felt theming is antiquated. I don't subscribe to that. Londoner just opened, and it's themed, but it's very well done. It's not kitschy. It's very fun. I encourage you to go see it because I think it really executes well.
Maybe just moving on. We've got a couple of questions, quite similar ones from the audience. Initiatives such as NBA's preseason games in Macao. What are the hurdles left for Sands to move into sports?
No, no. We're gonna, we're doing the NBA game this fall. No hurdles. We made a deal with the NBA. Patrick Rowan's the team in Dallas, and we're moving forward to doing NBA in Macao, which is very desirable. There are people who want to see the NBA. Years ago, we did a deal with Man U for a football, English football game there, and a lot of people told us no one wants to see, you know, English football. We didn't hold enough tickets for the casino, and we put them on sale the next day, and all 20,000 tickets were gone in 20 minutes. I said, "I guess that tells us how much we know about our own customers." They do want to see football. They do want to see NBA basketball, and we're giving them that. We're doing a lot of NBA games.
I think we're doing six or seven next couple of years. They have a voracious appetite for sports over there. Yeah. So we'll keep doing all those things: entertainment, NBA, etc.
What about particularly sports gambling?
Oh, sports gambling, I do not think that is in the cards right now. I do not think that there is a sports gambling group. I think it has been there for years, but it is not material, and we have never been offered to be in that business. Of course, we would love to be, but I do not think sports betting is gonna happen in Macao in the foreseeable future. Beyond the small, there is one outpost right now, I forget what it is called, that does it in a very minor way. On a major scale like Las Vegas, no, I do not see it.
Okay. Okay. What about companies' long-term thinking in online gaming? Is this an opportunity for you?
It's very difficult for us online. We've tried, we've looked at many things. We've experimented with something right now. The problem is, you know, we're late to the game. Online's very complicated and very competitive, very hard to break through. I mean, we really did try, but I don't see at this point, other than maybe a couple of things, looking at a real path to an online presence. Plus, it's painfully expensive to get into. At this point, people lost a lot of money trying to be in the, it's not an easy business. Sports betting has turned out to be, you know, not profitable at this point. Online's only in a couple of, four states in the U.S. I don't see us being able to compete easily in the online space.
It's very complicated, very big, and a lot of first movers way ahead of us.
Okay. What about, you talked about smart tables.
Yeah.
Earlier. I mean, maybe you can just talk about maybe what is a smart table.
Yeah.
Might be interesting for some people. And really what is that enhancing for you? You talked about the side bets. Is that more?
It's incredibly good for the industry for a couple of years. Smart table's nothing more than, you know, you've got the ability, the table, smart may be the wrong term. It's really more of a technology approach where you can see all the hands. For example, counterfeiting chips and cheating has always been part of the landscape in the gaming world. It eliminates that. If you bet a counterfeit chip, the game will stop right away, and the guy can be arrested or whatever, put in, put taken aside. So counterfeiting, it eliminates that. It eliminates cheating because you can see everything's being recorded, all the hands. If someone's playing games, the dealer internally or externally or working together, it eliminates all cheating. It's a fabulous tool for that. The most important thing it does, though, is you know your customer. The data, acquisition is amazing.
You can know what a person bets on every hand and how much they bet, what they bet. Because what you bet, you know, a person betting a lot of money on a flat bet is not nearly as important as a person betting a lot of money on a non-flat bet or on a side bet. So how they bet, propensity, the size of bankroll, how long they sit at the table. It gives you a perfect rating system to give complimentaries back to them. It also gives you the chance to, you know, to market to them on the game directly and offer all kinds of side wagering. It's very complicated. The layouts can be much more complicated. It takes the pressure off the dealer or the foreman or the pit boss to watch the game.
The game basically watches itself and also makes sure all the fills, everything's done properly in terms of the accounting on the game. I mean, they're expensive machines, but they're gonna revolutionize gaming, and I think you'll see them, it'll be in every place in, in a short time. They're too important not to be, especially in a high-volume environment like Asia.
What is the rollout at the moment?
we're basically done in this year in, in both jurisdictions.
Okay.
Macao and Singapore.
But in the sense that they're all fully.
Yeah.
Are they where you want to be?
Yep.
Yep.
No, they're going great. The reception of customers like them, I think there's a sense of comfort. There's a sense of awareness. They get their ratings done properly. Customers seem to gravitate to smart tables.
Okay. Wonderful.
Yeah.
What about, is there any other innovations, technological innovations, you know, maybe on slots or any of the other side that you would call out?
No. Basically, a smart table in table games emulates the slot experience. It gives you the ability to process information about the card. It's basically a slot machine's table game.
Right.
It gives you incredible depth. In the old days in Atlantic City, 100 years ago, you know, people put coin machines. It was a very old-school approach. That's all gone now. Obviously, the slot machine business moved much quicker than table games. It's only recently, the last 10 years, table games have started to catch up from a technology perspective. I think the smart table is the epitome of that technology, which is both valuable for security, counterfeiting, rating customers, new bets. It's an amazing progression in the right direction, and especially in Asia, which is table game predominant.
Let's move on to sort of new opportunities. I think I'm, I think I'm right.
It's a short meeting.
Maybe to start with, maybe the framework then.
Mm-hmm.
I think you target like a target return on invested capital of 20% if you were to find new projects. I mean.
We have in the past. That may be ambitious in this market today.
Yeah. I was gonna, if I, I guess if I very quickly try and do the maths on what you said about Marina Bay Sands.
Yeah.
It's a great property. It's not making 20% on the $5.8 billion.
Oh, no. It's making much more.
It's making more.
It's making, I can't do the math, but $2.5 billion, let's say $2.4 billion on $5.8 billion.
Okay. So that was perfectly.
It's still, it's been an amazing investment.
Yeah.
Macao has as well. The problem today is in the world, those opportunities are short. There is nothing in the U.S. for us, in Europe. The U.S., we just left New York, which may have been one of the great last opportunities. There is nothing happening in Texas right now. The only thing in the world to interest us in Asia would be Thailand, which is, we do not know what is going to happen there. It is early, early days. Thailand would give you, I think, a chance to, because the CapEx, OpEx in Thailand is hugely advantageous to the operator. If you have been to Thailand, the numbers are spectacular. I saw a project there that looks like Hudson Yards here, except it costs $4 billion versus whatever Hudson Yards cost, which I assume is more like $14 billion or whatever it was. You can build cheaper in Thailand. You can operate cheaper.
If they can get the legislation right, that's gonna be a great market for somebody.
What about Singapore? Is two properties the right number then? Obviously, you're building the second one. Could there be room for a third, or is that very hard to predict?
I wouldn't talk about that today 'cause I think we get through number two is enough.
Yeah.
I don't think the government has any interest in growing beyond that right now. We'll obviously let the government dictate that, but I don't see Singapore growing beyond our two properties and Genting's two properties for a long time.
Okay. So with limited opportunities out there to grow.
Yep.
Capital allocation, obviously invest, reinvest, and upgrade the properties.
Yeah.
You're looking really just, capital returns as being the primary.
If we, yeah. If we do not find other opportunities, we are gonna be making billions and billions of dollars with no place to spend it. We will simply put it back, obviously fix the houses, fix the properties, but then put the money back to investors. And the dividends or buy back shares. We have been buying back shares aggressively. We keep buying back shares, and we will keep doing that until the price gets better or maybe even beyond that. We have a, the days of us thinking this endless opportunity grow are over. I do not see any place other than Bangkok right now for our company to grow, put money to work anywhere near the kind of numbers you were talking about, 20%.
I think Bangkok will be a very, very solid return on capital, but I don't think there's any opportunity for us in Japan or Korea or Indonesia and the U.K., in the EU, or in the U.S. I mean, we're a company that's mature. We were once viewed as a very aggressive growth company. I think now we've become more of a make billions of dollars, buy back our shares, and put it back to investors. I think that's the future until something comes along unless Bangkok materializes, which Bangkok still has a lot of hurdles to get to the finish line. I wouldn't, I don't think Bangkok's a, is a fait accompli. It may not happen. We don't know.
What are the hurdles in Bangkok? Is it just government?
Oh, God, how many hurdles you want. That's it. You gotta approve the legislation. It's gotta be local friendly so the 70 million Thais can get in. At one point, they were insisting on a +$1 billion net worth, which you actually showed the, the casino had a $1 billion net worth. That's a pretty rare thing to do in Thailand. That would eliminate the local market. It would eliminate investment in Thailand. They've gotta pass it. They've gotta deal with the fact that I think the Chinese are weighed in on should the—there's a number of hurdles. What's the tax rate? What's the length of license? What's the admission for locals? There's a lot of hurdles. Thailand never actually gets done. It's not done. It's in, it's being considered. We've been there multiple times, but I wouldn't call that a sure thing.
Okay. Okay. Makes sense. Maybe just to finish off, you know, you're sadly stepping away from the CEO role. I think you said you're gonna stay there for two years as a consultant.
I stay till March and then I have a little consulting contract.
Consulting contract. Beyond that, I mean, what would you say are gonna be the priorities for your successor at LVS? What would?
There's no different than the hurdle we just talked about. There's finding what do you do with a company that makes a lot of money but has limited growth potential and having to deploy capital. If you cannot deploy capital, what do you do with it? How do you help investors get there? I think the truth is, sitting here today in May of 2025, it looks to me like the landscape's pretty predictable for anybody, whether it's Patrick or anybody else in this job. It is gonna be very much a capital allocation story. You'll have a wonderful amount of money coming in, and the question is, what do you do with it all? I think the answer is, at this point, fairly predictable, and you buy back shares and you put money back to investors in the form of dividends or whatever.
I don't see us—yes, Bangkok's interesting, but after Bangkok, nothing's really out there we can talk about with any kind of certainty. The way we do our business, the size of these things, the scale, very hard to find opportunities for us. There was a time I thought we'd grow in the U.S., that we'd grow in Asia, but I don't see that today. The big question is, what do you do with a company that makes, let's say, +$5 billion, has no real need for the money? You buy back shares and you do dividends, I guess.
Okay.
Not very hard to figure out.
On that simple note, I think we'll wrap it up.
Thank you.
Rob, thanks very much for your time today.
Appreciate it. Thank you.