Good afternoon. My name is Latoya, and I'll be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Las Vegas Sands First Quarter 2018 Earnings Conference Call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. I would now like to turn the conference over to Mr.
Daniel Briggs. You may begin.
Thank you. Joining me on the call today are Sheldon Adelson, our Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Rob Goldstein, our President and Chief Operating Officer and Patrick Dumont, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Before I turn the call over to Mr. Adelson, please let me remind you that today's conference call will contain forward looking statements that we are making under the Safe Harbor provision of federal securities laws. The company's actual results could differ materially from the anticipated results in those forward looking statements.
In addition, we may discuss non GAAP measures. A definition and a reconciliation of each of these measures to the most comparable GAAP financial measures is included in the press release. We also want to share that we have posted supplementary earnings slides on our Investor Relations website for your use. You may refer to those slides during the Q and A portion of the call. Also, Las Vegas Sands adopted the Financial Accounting Standard or Accounting Standard Codification 606, revenue from contracts with customers on January 1, 2018.
As such, all of our earnings materials reflect the adoption of ASC 606. Further information, including a comparison of LVSC consolidated results as originally reported and as reported reflecting the new accounting standards, is available in separate supplementary earnings slides on our website. Finally, for those who would like to participate in the question and answer session, we ask that you limit yourself to one question and one follow-up, so we might allow everyone with interest to participate. Please note that this presentation is being recorded. With that, let me please introduce our Chairman, Sheldon Adelson.
Thank you, Dan. Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. This was a record breaking quarter, and I'm very pleased that we delivered such exceptional results in each and every one of our markets. Companywide adjusted EBITDA reached an all time record of US1.5 billion dollars an increase of 31% over the prior year. Our Macao operations generated adjusted EBITDA of a whopping US789 $1,000,000 an increase of 26% over the prior year.
We broke a number of quarterly records, the highest ever mass table gaming drop and revenue, the highest ever retail mass sales, retail mall sales and the highest EBITDA margin since the Q3 of 2,006. At the same time, we achieved an all time quarterly record in adjusted property EBITDA in both Singapore and Las Vegas. As I said last quarter, the GMI middle name stands for Gary, but it also stands for growth and that is fully on display at present in each of our markets. The acceleration of Macau's mass market growth in the Q4 last year has continued into the Q1. Non rolling drop grew by 21% over the prior year and non rolling wind grew by 22% over the prior year.
This strong mass revenue growth combined with cost efficiencies drove significant margin expansion. Our whole normalized EBITDA margin a record 36.4% for the quarter, representing a substantial increase of 3.50 basis points compared with the prior year. The structural drivers that enable us to grow across all segments in Macau were on full display during the quarter. The scale and range of our hotel suite inventory, the diversity of our non gaming offerings, especially in retail and entertainment and the unique benefit of interconnectivity between our co type properties. These advantages allow us to attract more overnight visitors than any other operator as well as increase their length of stay.
We achieved hotel occupancy of 94% in the 1st quarter, maintaining the record occupancy that we enjoyed in the Q4 of 2017. As a result, we grew by an exceptional 35% in premium mass when compared to the prior year and our retail mall sales grew by 33% over the prior year with each of our 4 malls delivering strong growth. Our strategy to build integrated resource with scale and diversity is differentiated and is visibly paying dividends, especially in Macau as visitation increases from outside Hong Kong and Guangdong province. In support of that, official government statistics this week reported total visitations to Macau from Mainland China excluding Guangdong province were up 18% year on year in the Q1 of 2018. These visitors are staying longer in Macau and spending more time enjoying the ever growing diversity and critical mass of both gaming and non gaming attractions and amenities.
The Venetian introduced large scale non gaming amenities in Macau, retail malls, mice, live entertainment and arenas, which came to be known as Macau's first integrated resort. These attractions are now very well established in Macau and we're only growing importance and contribution to Macau's diversification in the future. Our market leading property portfolio received 23,800,000 visitors in the quarter, while Macao's total visitation was $8,500,000 It means we got almost 3 visitations from each visitor. The strong appeal and power of the critical mass of hotel, dining, retail and entertainment in our property portfolio of the Cotai Strip is evident. This demonstrates the appeal of our properties as they receive multiple visits from tourists each trip.
While much has been accomplished to date in the transformation of Macau into Asia's premier business and leisure tourism destination, We will not rest on our laurels. We will continue to invest substantial capital into our portfolio across every segment of our business. In particular, I am very excited by the way the design work for the Londoner is progressing. The Londoner will have a tremendous potential as a third landmark must see destination complementing the Venetian and the Parisian. Our commitment to further reinvest in Macau is not limited to the Londoner.
Many other significant capital projects are taking shape as we speak. The suite additions at Parisian, the renovation of our VIP gaming areas, a plethora of new and exciting F and B outlets and the full scale development of the 2 luxury hotel towers immediately adjacent to the Four Seasons and St. Regis properties, all of which will greatly bolster our growth prospects in the year ahead. We regard it as a privilege to contribute to Macau's success in realizing its objectives of diversifying its economy, supporting the growth of local businesses providing meaningful career development opportunities for its citizens including through our Sands Academy and reaching its full potential as Asia's leading business and leisure tourism destination. Now I'm going to move on to Marina Bay Sands in Singapore.
As mentioned earlier, we delivered an all time record quarter of Marina Bay Sands with EBITDA of US551 $1,000,000 an increase of 48% over the prior year. The quarter was marked by strong VIP and slot revenue growth. Normalized EBITDA margin increased by 2.90 basis points versus the prior year, reaching 58.7% for the 1st quarter. Supported by solid cost control and successful collection of receivables. Our retail mall also continues to outperform the broader Singapore retail market with strong excuse me, with strong tenant sales growth of 14% over the prior year.
We're proud that Marina Bay Sands stands as the ideal reference site for countries that are considering iconic large scale integrated resort developments. Turning to Las Vegas. We achieved an all time record adjusted EBITDA of US141 $1,000,000 an increase of 16% over the prior year. We achieved record hotel room revenues, underpinned by group room revenues and stronger backlog rates. So that's the summary of the quarter.
Did I mention that growth was fully on display? Now let's move to another of my favorite subjects, the result of capital to shareholders, Yay dividends and Yay buybacks. Our recurring dividend remains the cornerstone of our program to return excess capital to shareholders. Last October, the Las Vegas Sands Board of Directors approved an increase in our recurring dividend for the 2018 calendar year to $3 per share for the year or $0.75 per quarter. We have increased our recurring dividend to our shareholders every year since we first established it in 2012.
We remain deeply committed to our recurring dividend programs at both Las Vegas Sands and Sands China. And we look forward to increasing those recurring dividends in the future as our cash flows grow. We repurchased $75,000,000 of stock during the quarter. We will continue to use share repurchases to return excess cash to shareholders in the future. Our industry leading cash flows, geographic diversity and balance sheet strength enable us to continue our recurring dividend and stock repurchase programs, while retaining ample financial flexibility to reinvest in our existing properties and pursue new development opportunities.
In conclusion, our cash flow generation continues to be strong and predictable. The structural advantage from our scale, critical mass and product diversity was on full display in our strong financial results. The robust growth in the mass market in Macau continued during the quarter and the secular growth in Chinese travel and wealth creation together with enhanced transportation infrastructure bode well for future growth. We will continue to make significant investments in Macau because we have a long term and unwavering commitment to Macau. We look to the future with confidence.
We have a strong organic growth outlook. We are strategically reinvesting in our existing assets, while also pursuing new development opportunities. And we have both the intent and the financial strength to continue to return excess capital to shareholders. Yay dividends again. Thank you for joining us on the call today.
Now we'll take
The first question is from Thomas Allen of Morgan Stanley. Your line is open.
Hey, good afternoon and congrats on the good results. So focusing on Macau, I noticed that for your 3 larger properties RevPAR in the quarter was up anywhere from 27% to 29%. Can you just kind of talk about the trends there? Is that cash RevPAR? Is that stronger premium mass?
And then in the slides, you talk about your strengthening VIP business. Can you just touch on that a little bit more too? Thank you.
Sure. Thanks, Thomas. Just talking about our Bancal business in general and I'll answer your questions as well. The hotels are running about 94% occupancy and that's in a market that introduced 10,000 new sleeping rooms last 3 years. Just for commentary, food and beverage sales exceed $300,000,000 annually.
Our 850 retail stores saw a 33% increase in sales and will soon grow to about a $500,000,000 a year contribution. In our arena, which isn't spoken about much is week after week book with top stars, Small of the World. This week Bruno Mars sells out numerous shows. Macau has become a full blown destination resort for China, far beyond Guangdong and far beyond Hong Kong. The penetration into China is growing and growing and finding younger and more affluent customers and find Macao a compelling destination.
As you know, the bridge opens up sometime this year and soon the entire Pacific Rim, we have to fly into Hong Kong and take a car to Macau, which makes it pretty extraordinary. As to your question, it's driven by both more gaming demand, higher demand from the gaming side, but also higher cash demand. As you know, we run about fifty-fifty-fifty cash comp, but the comp standard keeps rising as does the cash ADR. And the gaming portion of our business just keeps growing and it's well balanced in all segments, whether it's rolling or non rolling tables or slots, there's strong double digit demand, which we believe is sustainable. And this is not 2013 or 2014, which is more rolling dependent.
This is a massive non gaming gaming market. We're at the epicenter of this. If you look at perspective. It illustrates our growth and the power of perspective. It illustrates our growth and the power of this segment.
And so Page 11 is worth a look. As is Page 15, which illustrates the growth of Macau's overall high margin mass gaming segment and that's the place we reside. As Sheldon referenced, we'll keep aggressively investing in Macao. London is engaged and work begins later this year. We expect this property to resemble The Venetian in terms mass and premium appeal from both the gaming, retail and lodging perspective.
Our Four Seasons St. Regis suite product will open in 2019 offering 600 additional suites. And one more point about our gaming business, our junket capacity today is about 50% where we want it to be. By 2019, we could offer as many as 21 junket rooms as opposed to our current 11. And these rooms we fully renovated with input from our partners with smoking rooms, easy And I think the And I think the demand for rooms is insatiable, hard to imagine running 94% plus in a market that's grown so much capacity.
It speaks so well to the penetration into China. It speaks so well to the surging demand both in gaming and non gaming perspective.
Thanks, Robin. Just as my follow-up, can we just touch on Singapore? You've had 4 quarters in a row now of high hold and you shifted your theoretical hold in Macau. Would you think about doing that in Singapore? And then any update on your thinking around the mall sale?
Thank you.
Look at the Page 40 of your deck, Thomas. That might be helpful to understand the change in our approach to the non rolling chip drop at Marina Bay Sands. We have adjusted and we have changed the methodology and perhaps that's illustrative of what we're trying to do there. It just keeps our business and stink across the globe.
Sorry, Thomas, did you also inquire about changing the normalization percentage for Singapore?
Yes, on enroll for Singapore. And then another question was just on the Marina on the mall sale potential.
We're constantly looking at our table mix and our play historically and looking at the math behind achieving the correct theoretical volumes. So in doing that, that was the review that we went into and we actually revised the whole normalization range in Macau based on the volume of play and the historical averages. When we think about Marina Bay Sands, we're constantly evaluating it. So if you look at our whole percentage over time, you'll see that we typically are holding outside of that range. So it is something that we constantly look at and when there is math to support that change, we'll definitely review it.
Thanks. And yes, the wholesale.
I think our answer to that is the same one that we had prior quarter. I think it's the best retail asset in the world today. If you look at the growth that we've experienced, just in the last quarter alone, you can see that sales per square foot for Marina Bay Sands, the trailing 12 months for the Q1 were above 1700 a square foot. There are not many malls of that size globally that have that type of productivity. So from our standpoint, it's an unbelievable asset and one that has trophy status at the highest level.
So from our standpoint, it should be very attractive to any potential investor. That being said, there's really nothing to talk about at this time, but eventually we hope to be able to achieve the cap rates the Chairman has alluded to in prior calls.
Great. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from Joe Greff of JPMorgan. Your line is open. Hi, Joe. Please check this if your line is on mute.
Good afternoon, everybody.
Hey, Joe. Hey, Joe. I mean,
obviously, what stood out to us was the approximate 35% growth in premium mass in Macau. I guess just trying to get a better understanding of the operating leverage there. I know you're still targeting segment profit margins in the 25% to 40% range. I'm presuming given that type of growth, you're at the high end of that range. I mean, can you give us a sense of where you were in the 1Q?
And again, to further better understand the operating leverage there, how do you think about that segment OpEx growth relative to the top line growth?
So I just have I missed the last part of the question. Can you repeat the second portion, John, sorry, about the leverage?
Yes. Just to get a better sense of the operating leverage when you guys are experiencing this type of segment growth. I guess, where were you in terms of segment margin for the 1 comp, presuming just where you ended up for the quarter, you're at the higher end of that 25% to 40%. And then maybe to complement that answer, where has that segment OpEx or where was that OpEx growth in the 1Q? And then I have a follow-up on Singapore.
Obviously, we're growing the demand in that segment is growing and so is the leverage. It's not changed a whole lot in the last few quarters, pretty much consistent. But to your point, as there's surging demand at the premium mass level, we're going to make more money and changing all that much against us. So leverage is growing, but more importantly demand is growing. And again, what we are seeing is a lifestyle thing.
We're getting people from further and further. You see the growth in non Guangdong, I think it's Slide 13, which talks about the growth outside of Guangdong province. I believe that's the yes, the growth of non Guangdong is hugely beneficial to us in filling our 13,000 rooms. And part of the reason why we're rethinking St. Regis, Londoner, Four Seasons because that's where the sweet spot is in that demand.
That customer is valuable, More of them are coming further away. We believe that even increases further with the bridge later this year. So I don't know it's going to grow a whole lot more as leverage, but there's a whole lot more demand, more top line and more value to those rooms than ever. And again, it's the retail component. It's the better sleeping rooms, it's the arena.
We have some great competitive structural advantages, which enable us to grow and grow to hopefully 800 and beyond. Patrick, do you want to take a piece of it?
Hey, Joe. So a couple of comments. I think a couple of quarters ago, we reviewed some of our cost cutting measures and call it cost offsetting measures in order to try to mitigate expanding costs as the business grew. I think
you could see some of
the benefits of that. I think Angie and the team there did a great job. If you look at our margins, you can see in the deck on page 10, our whole normalized adjusted property EBITDA margin was 29.1%, which excuse me, grew our EBITDA grew 29.1%, our margin itself was 36.4%. That's an incredibly strong flow through amount percentage. And we feel very confident that as revenues continue to grow as the mass market is deeper and more developed in our property portfolio, we'll have the ability to continue that margin potentially expand a little bit further.
I'd like to point out that we did a nice job with our controllable expenses in managing those. There are obviously variable expenses related to gaming taxes and other things, but those are out of our control as play grows. But from a controllable expenses standpoint, we've worked very hard to ensure that those only grow at minimum levels in to support our customer base. And I think you can see that today in our margin and the expansion that we showed just across the year, even on a normalized basis. So I think we're pretty happy with our margins.
We feel there's some more opportunity there as we continue to get improved flow through from the mass market because it is such high margin and looking forward to taking advantage of that as a market grows.
Joe, I think you know this from years looking Macao, the story we told years ago is actually occurring rapidly. The deep penetration into Mainland China, the deep growth of this market in terms of premium mass, it makes the margin appreciation easier to get to. So I think it's going to keep getting better and better as we see more top line, we'll deliver stronger and stronger margins and it's a very encouraging story from our perspective.
Great. That's helpful. And then for Marina Based Sands, you have on Page 25 of the slide deck, on a hold adjusted basis EBITDA grew 11% year over year. If you were to neutralize for FX and collections activity, what was that? I guess you had neutralized in both periods.
What was that EBITDA growth?
It came down to 420 as a whole normalized, I think we showed 420 the quarter. As you can tell by the numbers, there's de acceleration in the rolling segments, disappointing that segment has slowed down quite a bit. We held very well. The other aspects of our business look strong. The Patrick referenced the sales per square foot in the mall.
The ADR, the lodging business holding up nicely And our slots ETGs, the non rolling business, decent at 4.7, but there's a slowdown at the top line in terms of the that's a pretty soft quarter. We just played very lucky against that business and hoping to see return to a better day. But right now, that's the soft spot in Singapore. The rest of the business looks pretty decent.
Thank you. Okay.
Thank you. And the next question will come from Stephen Grambling of Goldman Sachs. Your line is open.
Hey, good afternoon. Thanks for taking the questions. I guess as a follow-up to your response to Joe's question just now on customers coming from outside Guangdong, how does the spend from that customer base compare to those coming from the existing regions? And as you think about the typical new customer spend trajectory, do you typically see a ramp in spend from those visiting for the first time?
Well, it's higher for a couple of reasons. One is they come from further away and they're very I think they're very lifestyle driven. What our teams described to us is this acceleration of younger people who are very affluent, bring their families, want to stay as much as 4 nights. They want to see Bruno Mars or whoever the star is that weekend. They want to shop at the stores.
They want to go to the spa and they bring families and they like to gamble. It's quite a great combination. So they're not necessarily stay longer as they gamble more and have more time to spend in our shops. It's a positive thing. But more positive is as you can see by that chart on Page 20 or 13 rather, the acceleration of demand outside Guangdong is incredible.
And I think when you start seeing the Pacific Rim Song at the airport and the transportation via bridges there that hopefully that process or that approach keeps getting better for us. We have 13,000 soon 1300 sleeping rooms, pretty powerful products we have coupled with our 850 shops and our spas and our entertainment. So the answer is they spend more time, they spend more money, they're younger and there's more of them coming every day. And it's a very positive trend for Macau. I think this property, our properties are built for this customer and this customer is showing up in mass.
And so we believe this quarter is really, I think this quarter redefines where Macau is going in our mind. It's becoming a very, very impressive place, a retail destination, a spa destination, an eating, lodging, lifestyle destination. We're very encouraged by the things we're seeing, our trends. Our team is very excited about what's happening to our business in Macao.
I guess one quick follow-up on that. I mean, I guess what kind of data are you able to collect on that customer now that you can potentially utilize in the future? Is it equivalent to the existing kind of database of customers?
Yes, of course, we collect data the same way we've always collected. We have extensive database and we have extensive information with customers because that's the nature of this business, isn't it? So of course, we have extensive data on that customer, yes.
Thanks. I'll jump back in the queue.
I'm going to share that extensive data, but you're watching.
Thank you.
The next question is from Shaun Kelley of Bank of America.
My main question would just be to maybe follow-up on Patrick's comments on operating expenses. But by our account in Macau, it looks like operating expenses were super well controlled in the market for the quarter. The question is, how sustainable is that as we move through the year and sort of what kind of level of trajectory of inflation
should we
sort of be considering or thinking about in those types of expenses?
I'll just before Patrick, I'll just say, I think it's going to Sean, obviously margins are driven by a few different variables, but the top line is growing and the quality customer is growing That makes margins easier to achieve. And I think our team has demonstrated an ability to deliver top line coupled with margin and great flow through. I think it's better. I don't think it's the question of just I hope it gets better, not deaccelerates. I think we have with our offerings and with our team's approach to this premium mass customer, if we get our junket business where I hope we can get it to, which couples up nicely with premium mass, I would think we've seen more top line business, which would create more flow through.
So I don't think we have much risk of it decelerating. Got you.
I think the current environment should allow for what Rob has described. I think the CEC there has done a great job. I think the market itself is very favorable on the revenue side and we hope to see continued further margin expansion in the upcoming quarters. Of course, there's no way to predict what will happen, but we feel very confident that we'll be able to manage cost appropriately.
Great. And just as my follow-up then, I mean, Rob, you alluded to what's going on the VIP side and that's a target area for you guys. I mean, I think if I got the slide decks correct, then last quarter saw roughly 4% growth in VIP, this quarter that jumped up to 20 21. Can you talk a little bit about what initiatives you may have in place that already started to drive a little bit of that and then what you might have on the comp?
Yes, look, we're not happy with our VIP segment. We can do better. We want to do better. People think because we're so dominant in the slot business ETG and not only in table that we should see that segment. We're not going to do that at all, just the opposite.
We have spent a lot of capital, a lot of time with our partners to create we think are the best environments, most accessible, egress access, smoking friendly in terms of 2019 January. Our goal is to accelerate our VIP play because we think it's important both as a segment unto itself, but as you know it offers crossover opportunities in the mass. So, we're very happy that we are investing large amounts of dollars and time in an approach that we think will grow our junket business and other segments as well. We are not finished. We want to be a much bigger player in that segment and we've got some wonderful partners that we're listening to very carefully to grow that segment.
Thank you very much.
That 17 illustrates where we're at, but again, we hope we get to a much better place.
Thanks a lot.
Thank you. The next question is from Anil Daswani of Citi. Your line is open.
Hey, good morning guys. Thanks for taking my question. First of all, with all the new infrastructure that's coming online in Macau with the bridge as well as the new high speed link to LOTUS, hopefully, do you guys see that as a driver more for the base mass business rather than the premium mass business? And do you believe that we could see a shift in the focus of the market to this base mass business that you guys are incredibly strong in?
Yes, we do. Very simply put, all new products in the market, be it the rail, be it the bridge, anything and everything that drives more base and more business in that market, we're hugely in support of and excited about. I think we waited a long time. I think I was 28 when they started that bridge and I'm now almost 41. So it's been a long time.
But we're damn excited about the bridge. It offers a whole new entree into different segments. I mean the real story Macao, yes, it's Hong Kong, it's Guangdong, but the real growth potential resides outside of Guangdong. You see it in that one slide. We've done that for years.
It's really actually happening with it. The growth in those markets are extraordinary. I also believe the rim can open up too. The Macao has become in the 40 years I've been going there, it's become a wonderful destination. The government has done extraordinary job and we've invested 1,000,000,000 of dollars to make it a place that is extraordinary.
What's happening in Cotai is nothing short of exemplary development of a property that has opened up wonderful IRs to a bunch of people. So as the infrastructure completes the picture for both local and for foreign tourism, we're going to be at the epicenter and believers that can drive more business, both base and premium mass. So of course we're both supportive and enthused about what's happening there. It can only be good for us. We're the biggest player in the market in terms of hotel rooms, lodging, retail, gaming capacity.
We intend to be aggressive in trying to create more capacity there. So sure, it's a positive for us, of
course. Perfect. And as my follow-up, clearly with Japan's hotting up again, seems like everyone's expecting a bill to get tabled at some point at the end of this week even potentially. If you guys had the choice and you could pick between or Osaka, which are the 2 favorite cities at this point in time for big urban centers, can you suggest which one you'd prefer?
Mr. Allison? We're still assessing that.
We want them all.
That's the better answer. We're still assessing that. They're both very good. The Yokohama is, we call it like a bedroom city, bedroom community to Tokyo. Tokyo has got about 32,000,000 people in Tokyo metropolitan area which your government is part.
And but Osaka is about 12,000,000 to 14,000,000 With 20,000,000 if you go to the outline, the entire right. Entire. It's we're still assessing that. The Yokohama location is right downtown and the Osaka location is the furthest island. Next stop is the other side of Tokyo Bay and after that next stop is Hawaii, Midway Island.
And the location is much further away from downtown, but so it's very difficult to say. We haven't 1st of all, we don't think that anything is going to happen. They'll appoint the operators according to everything Irene and all the clippings that we are number 1 in line, we've got the best chance of getting the first choice. So we've been lobbying for that location for better part of 10 years for Japan. And now it looks like it's coming to fruition.
It may even be by this Friday that they'll submit the IR bill. But then again, you hear other people say that it's postponed for a week or 2. But something that I heard from somebody in Korea was a little more encouraging than what we've been hearing in the last year or 2. Thinking about making another location outside of Seoul, a Korean Nationals Visitation Casino in an integrated resort. We think we're also in number 1 in that line.
And Korea could be real. We're also looking at Brazil, I'm going down there in a couple of few weeks. Again, we've had people from there come up here. We're optimistic that in the near future, we should know more about getting at least one of those either Korea, Japan or Brazil or hopefully more than one.
So we're very enthused about that.
Thank you, guys. Very enthused. Yes. Thank you, guys.
Thank you. The next question is from Felicia Hendrix of Barclays. Your line is open.
Hi, good afternoon. If we could just go back to Macau for a second, obviously your results were outstanding. I'm just wondering if we could drill back on Page 11 of your deck in the premium mass slide or part of the slide where it shows that the win, the premium mass table win in the quarter was basically sequentially flat. So I was just wondering is there anything to read into that because obviously everything else is so strong?
I think it's more about whole percentage. As we were dropping the kind of volume we're doing, Felicia, these numbers are so extraordinary. I hate this. I've said this a few times and the truth is a point here, a point there makes a big difference. So if you pick up a point Q on Q, we actually lost a point whole percentage on the kind of volumes we're doing, it's pretty extraordinary.
So I can't do much about that. We play a point lucky. We start talking $20,000,000,000 $25,000,000,000 of a drop in a year, a point means a lot. It's like real money. And the story is we actually had a nice sequential growth in the quarter, but we didn't hold as well, dropped a point in hold.
That's the whole story. I think our mass tail business and our premium mass tail business just continue to outperform even our expectations here in Las Vegas. So it's simply a whole percentage. So probably we're up single digit about 6%, 7% I think Q on Q and up I think 21% year on year. So factoring a point here in whole percentage, we held 22% versus 21.8% and therein lies the drop off.
Okay. That's perfect. That's what I was looking for. Okay. And then just if we can switch gears to Las Vegas for a moment, just your properties in Las Vegas, they generated some it was moderate, but some RevPAR growth in the quarter, but we were actually expecting you to be down, given the tough comps, Wynn also reported growth yesterday as well within RevPAR.
So just wondering, can you just talk about what you're seeing in Las Vegas? I mean, there was a tough comp in the quarter. The market is still recovering, but it seems like it could be better than we expect?
Well, I think so. We did a record quarter, dollars 140,000,000 EBITDA is the best I've been here since we opened. That's the best quarter in history. So we're doing something very right. And the nice news, it's not about whole percentage or luck.
We just we didn't we held within the expected range. We had a strong, strong MICE business, strong ADR coming out of FIT, incredible banquet demand. It was $70 plus 1,000,000 in the quarter of food and beverage. Gaming business was really strong, great Chinese New Year's, great international play. We held normal, nothing exceptional.
So if you can make $140,000,000 in Las Vegas in a quarter without doing something lucky, that's pretty exceptional results. We're very proud of the team. Margins look good. Future looks bright and our outsized results will depend on not historically we've always been a very good performer in the lodging segment and the food and beverage. Our variable I think there is contingent upon getting more international play in the door.
We did this quarter. We played fortunately within the range and boom $140,000,000 quarter, which is exemplary.
Would you say would you attribute most of the growth to the international play and perhaps the domestic is more flattish? How would you look at the complexity of that?
Yes, that's fair to characterize. Our slot business was stellar. It remains strong and we're very happy with the margins and the top line. Our mass play, we have more work to do to get to increase, but that's the Las Vegas story across the board. It sounds like Macau where you expect 20% 30% growth.
It's tougher here in Las Vegas. But international play, we need to get our to show these kind of quarters successfully and sustainably, we need to get more international play and keep it. There was a time in our history, it was pretty commonplace. We fell off a bit and I think we're back to a better place. But yes, to deliver $150,000,000 $140,000,000 $130,000,000 quarters, we're going to need a continued contribution of drop from the table game side.
But again, it was an exceptional hole. We're in the range with strong Asian play, strong Chinese New Year's Cup with amazing lodging results and strong F and B.
Great. Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question will come from Carlo Santarelli of Deutsche Bank. Your line is open.
Hey, thanks everyone. Rob, as Sheldon, I think mentioned earlier in the call, talked a little bit about expansion of the VIP footprint in Macau. Could you just talk a little bit right now in terms of however you can categorize it, your mix between kind of your junket business relative to your direct in house business and the plans for kind of the direct business going forward?
Carlo, I don't want to talk break out our numbers. We have a strong business in Premium Direct and as I referenced earlier, I want to get better at the junket side. We're very happy with our premium direct business. We want to grow our junket business. As I referenced and Sheldon referenced, we're dedicating capital and more importantly, we're dedicating manpower and brainpower to figure out how to do better in that segment.
We should do better and we want to drive more VIP. Let's be very clear about that. So we're spending a lot of money on rooms at the direction of our partners, making sure access, egress is good, making sure smoking friendly and getting ready for 2019. I won't break out the numbers, but I will tell you we're growing in the junk segment. We're double digit growth year on year and sequentially growing.
But I want to see more. I think we need more because that segment is growing again and we should be bigger participants. And as I referenced earlier, there's a spillover effect in the premium mass. There's a value there. So we are very laser focused on getting better at that segment.
We're very happy with other segments. We only be better in our junket partner segment.
And Rob, if I may just ask a quick follow-up. You mentioned obviously that spillover effect. What does that stem from? Is there almost a crowding out of liquidity on the VIP side? And as you mentioned earlier, kind of constantly adjusting levels for hotel room comps, but does the same type of phenomena happen within VIP?
Or at least are you guys seeing that where you're starting to see some of your previously lower rung VIP players kind of be more or less pushed into the premium mass segment, which is obviously a good problem to have for you guys. But is that happening as you think about liquidity in the junket market today and junkets being a little bit more discerning about which customers they're taking in?
I think you're absolutely right. They're more discerning. Their coffers are full liquidity. And so why not be balanced and why not enable our people want to be a junket customer, go to the junket side. You want to be a premium direct, go to that side.
What we're seeing though, again, our hotel rooms are getting more and more demand from further and further away. Those people tend to be less junket sensitive and more into the premium direct side, whereas Guangdong tends to be more junket preference. But it's not my job to tell people what to gamble to do. I just want to make sure they have access to capital and we have access to sleeping rooms and junk rooms they want to play in. So we're again, we're a equal opportunity gambling house.
We want to give all kinds of opportunity to our customers to go to the place they want to gamble. We're happy wherever they gamble. But you know and I know liquidity is there, growth is there and they're darn good partners to have. So we're very happy to work with them.
Great. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for participating in today's conference. This concludes the program. You may all disconnect. Everyone, have a great day.