Las Vegas Sands Corp. Aktie

Thanks very much for joining the 4:30 session here at the Strategic Decisions Conference, 42nd Annual Strategic Decisions Conference.

Anyone that doesn't know me, I'm Richard Clarke. I'm the GLL analyst, OTA cruise analyst here at Bernstein. and delighted to have Patrick Dumont here for, I guess, your first Strategic Decisions Conference, if that's.

That's right. Thanks so much for having me.

We're delighted to have you here representing Las Vegas Sands. So maybe for anyone in the room that doesn't know the business that well, maybe just a short description and then you've been in the job now for, I guess, 3 months? Is that about right? Not new to the industry, not new to the business. I appreciate that. But just any first impressions, early impressions of sitting in the hot seat.

I think the great thing is I've worked for the company for almost 16 years. And so our team is a group that's worked together for a long time. You asked for a description of our company. We are the premier developer and operator of integrated resorts in Asia. So our founder, Sheldon Adelson, had a vision for large-scale growth in tourism through scale investments for both leisure and business tourism, and he accomplished that. And so today, we're the scale operator in 2 of the most important markets in the world for our industry.

Great. Well, I mean, I think when we hosted the company before, we've always started in Macau, but now it feels like we should start in Singapore for the best news. So I think Singapore has now become pretty much your biggest or at least joint biggest part of the business, exceeded, I think, anyone's expectations of what they would have had for Marina Bay Sands. Maybe you could just talk us through what's driven that success? Is that structural? Have you had some cyclical upside from it? What's driving the strong performance you've seen in Singapore in the last year or so?

If you look at our company's history, we've always created success through investment. So the first investment that the company did was based on changing the status quo about developing something new that had both leisure and tourism components.

And we -- our company brought that to Singapore. And I think there's always been a long-term vision about the growth of Singapore. I think our company has a very positive view about Singapore and its long-term potential, and we've been investing behind that thesis for more than 15 years. And so if you look at Marina Bay Sands, it's actually always exceeded industry expectations. When it was first opened, I think people didn't anticipate just how well it received it would be. It created massive tourism growth for Singapore, which was the goal, created a lot of follow-on foreign direct investment, which was the goal. And we've had a great partnership with Singapore in developing high-value tourism over time. We've invested a lot in the MICE industry there. We've invested a lot in entertainment and in hospitality. And I think the last round of investment that we did, which was a $1.75 billion reinvestment program, really created a much better experience for high-end patrons and high-end guests.

And we really focused on a few things. We focused on the product. We focused on the design, the materiality of our rooms, how we would service our customers. And we created a whole new category of suite product that we didn't have before on top of renovating our food and beverage and some of the other experiences our guests would have, and that helped create the growth that we see today in Singapore.

So for us, it's really in the most important market in our industry in terms of the high-end part of it. The structural tailwinds for Singapore are extraordinary, and we have a government that is investing in other sectors to help high-value tourism. So I think it's a great market. Southeast Asia is growing. There's a lot of wealth creation and a lot of people are looking for tremendous experiences, unique experiences, and they come to us. And so it's very fortunate that we're there.

So is Singapore now the destination for premium gaming tourism? Is that now overtaken Vegas, Macau, it's the top destination now to go to if you want a gaming vacation?

That's what it seems like. That's what we -- that's what our goal was. Our goal was to create the best hospitality experiences in the world, the best service experiences in the world, the best dining, the best entertainment in a way that these critical massive amenities would drive the highest value tourists. And I think we've achieved that, and we're going to continue to invest and continue to look to grow.

So talk to us about the extension. So I think $8 billion, correct me if I'm wrong.

Expansion.

Expansion. Sorry. Okay. Well, maybe you explain exactly what the expansion is then in the -- if I'm using the wrong term in Singapore. Fourth tower, am I again using the wrong term here? But...

All good. All good.

What are you looking to achieve by adding this extra capacity, what does that add to the product in Singapore?

I think we've learned a lot in the last 15 years about the market and about its potential. And we've been able to get the benefit of some of that knowledge and experience in the recent reinvestment that we did and the EBITDA growth that you've seen across through 2025.

And I think now we're looking at our IR2, and it will have a name besides IR2 by the time we open it. We're looking at IR2 as a way to take all of that knowledge and experience and create a higher level of luxury, a higher level of unique hospitality experiences, a higher level of food and beverage, a higher level of gaming and most importantly, a higher level of entertainment with a new 15,000-seat live performance venue that really creates experiences that our customers can't get any place else to continue our leadership in Southeast Asia as the premier IR.

And talk to us about the sort of getting a return. I mean, sitting from a sort of hotel analyst, $8 billion sounds like a lot of money to spend on an expansion, or an extension, whatever it is. What -- is this -- are you hoping to get the same return on that investment as you put into the original Marina Bay Sands Hotel?

We think about it as a total investment. So we don't break it into its component parts. We think about it as we spent close to $6 billion building Marina Bay Sands. We spent several billion dollars recently renovating it. We spent almost a little bit more than $1 billion over the years in CapEx in certain areas.

And then with the expansion of $8 billion, I do want to point out that $2 billion of that is actually land premium to the Singapore government, right? And so you could almost think about that as amortizing that over the life of the investment of the lease. But more importantly, even if you want to consider the $8 billion, I would say that when you look at all of that spending in aggregate and you look at the productivity of the asset in aggregate, we would exceed our return thresholds that we expect.

So we're very excited about it. We have a very long-term view about Singapore. We consider this a tremendous opportunity for our company to invest in this scale with these type of assets in this market, given what the market has in terms of its productivity. And we're very excited about it, and we're optimistic about the returns. Otherwise, we wouldn't be doing it.

Absolutely. And is the current level of profitability you enjoy in Singapore, I think it's a 52% EBITDA margin. Is this a sustainable margin through the future of Singapore? Or does eventually get competed away in some way?

So I think what's interesting about Marina Bay Sands is if you look at it throughout its history, its margin structure has been the best in the industry at that scale, right? I think that's driven by the quality of investment and the type of patrons that are available in Singapore as a market, which is unique. It's a very high-end market. It is rarefied air. These are the best patrons in the world, and they're there in scale. And so for us, to be able to have an opportunity to expand and take advantage of this is very powerful.

And you mentioned it there that the expansion will take on a bit more of an entertainment focus. Is this to attract a different customer to the property? Or is this providing more experiences to your existing kind of core customer base, you're trying to expand the appeal of Marina Bay Sands with adding more of these entertainment type?

So it creates opportunities for a couple of different types of customer. I think it will drive more foreign tourism into Singapore. You saw that with Taylor Swift. You saw that with Lady Gaga. You see that with F1 that high-quality entertainment events drive visitation in Singapore.

And so we think that will be a great benefit to not only Marina Bay Sands, but also Singapore tourism as a whole. We think it will be a very unique experience for our high-value patrons because the type of luxury entertainment experience that we're going to present in the new arena is going to be unique to Asia. We're going to have a lot of high-quality amenities within the arena and create experiences that our customers can't get any place else. And I think the third component is it will be great for Singaporeans because now they'll have a live performance venues that they don't have today in Singapore. And so I think it hits a couple of different components, and it will do them all very well.

Okay. And then talk to us about the MICE opportunity maybe there as well. That's also going to be accelerated by the expansion you're going to be there? And how important is that to the Singapore customer, the Singapore revenue pool?

So Singapore has a goal of actually growing MICE materially over the next couple of years. And so there's been a lot of focus on how to grow MICE. And so we have an additional MICE component in our expansion in IR2. And this MICE component will be very important because it allows us to host events that we can't accommodate today because of the capacity. We'll also add another large-scale ballroom that's column-free. And of course, the arena itself is very useful for MICE because of the types of sessions you can run now and the types of events that you can have in coordination with the exhibition space and the convention space.

So for us, this just helps fill out and make our offering stronger. So it will be a good component of the MICE offering that Singapore has.

So beyond the current projects, is there more investment opportunities in Singapore?

Is there more opportunities in Singapore? Like can you keep growing fifth tower, sixth tower, seventh tower, other sites...

Let's start with this one. Let's see how it goes. But I like how you think. Hopefully so.

And then maybe just to throw in one short-term question here. Obviously, we've seen a lot of in Asia about jet fuel shortages and flights, et cetera. And I guess with Singapore, in particular, it's very much a transportation hub. Are you seeing any impact from sort of flight turmoil in terms of the demand coming into Singapore?

Right now, we don't have anything to report. And the question remains how long does this go on? And so we'll wait and see. But as of right now, there doesn't seem to be anything that we can measure.

Okay. Perfect. Let's shift over to your other key markets, Macau. I guess it would be fair to say we're in a slightly different trajectory to Singapore. Is this simply a cyclical impact of a softer Chinese consumer? Is it getting more competitive than maybe Singapore has been? Or is there any sense that you've kind of underperformed in that market?

So Macau is very interesting because Singapore opened after the pandemic at a different time line.

And when you think about when Macau opened in January of '23, there was a lot of uncertainty about what that would actually look like.

And it took a little while for the visas to actually hit a normal run rate. And so the -- as Macau opened as a market, it didn't recover as a snapback. So in other markets when the pandemic finally receded, there was a snapback. Macau had more of a ramp. And so it was uncertain what the ultimate market stability would look like, the stabilization point.

And the great news is Macau has actually kept growing. So if you look at the gross gaming revenue run rate in '23 when it first opened, it was more than $10 billion less than it is today. And over time, the patrons who have returned to Macau are actually new. There's a lot of new customers coming to Macau. A lot of them skew younger. They bring their families. And a lot of them have made a significant amount of wealth in the last 5 years because of the growth that has occurred across Southeast Asia and China in certain sectors.

And so what we're seeing is it's really a more premium-led recovery as opposed to the unrated play, which represented a large portion of our business. And so we're the scale player in the market. We have the most assets, the most hotel rooms, the most gaming positions. And so for us, it represents an opportunity to invest and actually change the way we address the market for the segments that are now the most powerful and the deepest, which we have the capacity to do. And so what we intend to do is invest over time and actually make adjustments based on some of the ways we position ourselves post pandemic to ensure that for the long term, we invest for success. But we believe very strongly in the Macau market.

We think there's a bright future there. Its feeder is China, Hong Kong and certain other countries and smaller amounts. And we feel like that the future is very bright given the level of investment there and the high-quality assets that exist in Macau today.

So is that a very different customer split than Singapore. Singapore is broader. It's not just Chinese and Hong Kong customers. that's coming from all around Southeast Asia.

I mean, can you attract those customers to Macau as well? Can you broaden the appeal of it? Or is it about getting the Chinese customer right that's about winning in Macau?

So it is very different feeder markets for both of these properties or grouping of properties in Macau. So Singapore is really inbound tourists from all around Southeast Asia. So Indonesia, Malaysia, Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand, a little bit of Laos, some South Korea, some Japan. But it's really more of a local Southeast Asia customer base.

And when you look at Macau, it's what I described before. And the thing that's interesting about Macau is that we have a mandate to grow inbound tourism from other countries. And so all of us as a group of concessionaires are working on doing that. And it's much easier now because the Hong Kong Airport is readily accessible with the bridge that goes from the Hong Kong Airport to Macau. And so that is something that we're working on to help make a reality.

But because of the attractiveness of the Macau assets and their relative competitiveness to other hospitality centers globally, we feel like that's a possibility for the long term, and we're working towards that.

And so talk to us about some of the investments you're doing into Macau. So if I understand correctly, the attractive customer now is a little bit more premium than it used to be. So what do you need to do in your properties to attract that customer? How much investment is maybe necessary to get to that to attract that customer?

So I think for us, we're really focusing on 3 things. We're focusing on our product, which is part of the innovation that we talked about. I mentioned on our earnings call about how we're looking to engage in a CapEx program over the next 3 years to help create higher opportunities for return on investment.

We're really focused on our people to ensure that we have the right people in the right positions to maximize the value of the assets. And most importantly, for our customers, we're really improving our service.

It's something that post pandemic, we've had a lot of work to do on, and we're doing it. And so when we combine all these things, we feel like we'll have a really good opportunity to address the market and attract these high-value patrons. But they're a very discerning group. They're very sophisticated. They're on social media. They travel internationally. They're aware of other markets. And so you have to be very competitive on a global basis to ensure that you retain these patrons. And so it really is about investment in those things.

So talk to us about the Londoner. So that's now -- is that fully open?

Is that your favorite property of ours?

I like to go to a theme properties based around where I was.

Because you can go from Venice to Paris to London, all in one day.

[indiscernible] Fish and chips and David Beckham suites in there. But I mean, how well has that product resonated? I guess it's a new theme, if you like, for casinos, I guess, Parisian and -- and Venice have been well tried and tested. Is Londoner a theme that resonates with?

London is a hit. I have to tell you, London is a hit. But I think the takeaway is theming is not easy in our industry. There was a time when, particularly in the history of Las Vegas, the theming had a certain amount of import to it.

And I think for us, because our Macau properties are themed, we have to do it in a way that is both tasteful and remains current relevancy, right? I think we were able to do that with the Londoner. I think it's a lot of fun. It has some whimsy to it and people are happy with it. But I also think at the end of the day, it comes down to the performance of the asset. And if you look at what we were doing before and the results after, you can see that there is a real opportunity for growth there.

I think the other thing to note is just as an operator, our properties that are most freshly renovated are the ones that perform the best. And that makes sense intuitively. Someone who understands hospitality very well, there's a need not only to invest to offset depreciation, which is real in our industry. You really have to invest to keep your properties fresh, but also to create experiences that are new that keep people talking about it. And I think we've done that well with the Londoner transformation.

And I guess when you talk about sort of Marina Bay Sands back in Singapore, I think they actually took rooms out to make the rooms bigger and more premium. Is that something that's an option in Macau?

Is that something that's also going on, you can sort of premiumize the product, make it more exclusive?

We've done that. I think if you look at the transformation of Londoner, particularly most notably with the Londoner Grand product, that was a Sheraton hotel, and we basically went two-for-one. And we did that to create better experiences for people and go out of the room product into a suite product. And we were fortunate because of the way the floor plates worked that we're able to do it in a very efficient way.

And so I think we've got an outcome that works very well, particularly with the direction of the market and where the deepest segments are to be able to create these suite products to attract these high-value tourists in Macau.

But we still have hotel rooms in all of our hotels, but we are also overweighting certain types of suite products to ensure that we can grow with the market given where it's headed.

Okay. Makes sense. How -- I mean, if we sort of think about -- you kind of mentioned there you need to do theming right. Is -- you switched over Sheraton product to one of your own brands. Can we take that to mean that, that kind of branding product like having Four Seasons or Ritz-Carlton or Sheraton above the door, that is resonating less for your customers, and it's more about the quality of the product that matters.

No. I think it depends on the brand, where the brand positions versus where the customers are headed because these are international brands. The Sheraton brand is a very strong brand globally. But when we made the decision, was it right for the type of customer that we wanted to attract into the building, given who's available to come to Macau and the type of investment we were making and does it fit with the theming of the property that we felt would be a marketing advantage. And so we have a great relationship with Marriott. We have a great relationship with the other hotel operators. We have a great relationship with Four Seasons. And there are some brands that work with what we're trying to do, and there are some brands that maybe are not aligned at this time. And so Four Seasons is a great brand. And they've done great work, and we really appreciate the partnership. And it's a brand that I think resonates really well with the customers that we have on that property. Same thing is true with the St. Regis. It's been a great brand to have, and it's done very well for us.

So I think it really depends on the type of product. There are certain things that we do at the very high end that are necessary to brand with a proprietary brand, right? There are certain things that we offer that are a certain level of design, a certain level of aesthetic, a certain level of service that goes beyond the typical 5-star hotel. And so therefore, it makes sense to identify with the brand that we control.

That makes sense. Maybe just going for a bit more of a short-term question here on Macau as well. What is your sort of macro outlook for Macau? I mean are you seeing Chinese consumer spending? You positive on that trend? Is it a necessary positive trend for you? Do you have a sort of positive outlook that there will be macro tailwinds in Macau for your business?

So I have a very positive outlook for Macau for the next 3, 5 and 10 years. And that's the reason why we're so confident to continue to invest there. I think it's a very unique collection of assets. I think there's been a huge amount of infrastructure that takes people directly into Macau from China, the rail system, the bridge, the connection to the Hong Kong Airport. All of these things are very powerful and very helpful. But also more importantly, there's a broader initiative to create a more powerful economic engine in the Greater Bay Area, which we're the hospitality component of. So in the long term, we feel very strongly that this investment will be part of a much larger initiative that we'll follow along with.

And we think that's positive just from a broader macro tailwind. I think the other thing is when you look at the size of the gaming market, given all the turbulence that you're seeing in sort of recent economic trends in the region, it's a $30 billion-plus gaming market. So imagine how well it's going to do when things stabilize and return to growth as you've seen prior to some of the turbulence.

So we feel very confident in the long term. We're very thoughtful in the way that we invest. But we think overall, given the rising middle class in China, the wealth creation that's going on in Southeast Asia and demand for high-quality experiences today, we think we're positioned very well.

And just to repeat the question we asked in Singapore, like is this also a market where things like entertainment and MICE are also important to attracting that incremental consumer into the market?

I think there are different pillars of the operation. And I think entertainment is very interesting because we have a partnership with the NBA and we present NBA preseason games and the NBA China games in Macau. And that's been a very strong success because it helps create buzz and a halo effect around tourism for Macau. It allows us to attract customers to draw attention to us, be able to show us as a relevant and internationally interesting tourism destination and really highlights the high-quality assets that Macau has because people pay attention to what the NBA does, particularly in China.

And I think other entertainment acts that come to Macau also bring that. There's K-pop acts that show up both with us and with some of our competitors' venues. And all of this is beneficial to Macau. So I think highlighting Macau as a tourism entertainment destination is very positive for the city, creates a buzz around the city and creates interest, which ultimately translates into visitation.

Great. I've got a couple of questions from the audience on Macau. Thanks for submitting those. Maybe this is wing into one of mine, but it kind of -- if I look at your stock price, it almost feels like Macau has driven your stock maybe more than the Singapore success. Is that fair? Maybe what is the misunderstood there? And would you ever consider spinning off or splitting the business between Macau and Singapore?

So I think I would encourage everyone to go to Macau and actually see it, anyone who wants to, we're happy to give you a tour and show you around just to see the high-quality tourism assets that are there. And I think the quality visitation there is also quite high as so evidenced by our growth in retail, some of the things we've experienced.

I think we have some work to do on our end. And I think we're going to embark on that, and we're going to obviously invest to improve where we are. But we have no interest in spinning off Macau.

We actually think that it's great for Las Vegas Sands to be a scale operator in both of these markets. We think there's synergies for management. We do have players that go back and forth. We think there's a branding component. And if you look out for the long term, we think this is a great asset base, and it's one of the foundational parts of our company. So I can't tell you why the market isn't viewing our cash flow with the same level of quality as we believe that it has. I will tell you that I think Singapore is the highest quality cash flow in our industry, just given the high barriers to entry, the quality of customer, the market that it's in and the EBITDA margins that it produces.

But I think Macau is an unbelievable market for its potential. There's a limited number of operators there. And over the long term, we feel very strongly about it. There's a lot of people in this room that might be able to answer this question better than I can. But I will tell you is that we fundamentally believe in the long-term value of our company. So we've been buying back stock aggressively, and we'll continue to do that. And so we're -- we think the valuation is low, and we think it's an opportunity for us to buy as much as we possibly can.

So we've been buying stock very aggressively. And we think that this enhances shareholder returns and increases our free cash flow per share, and we're very happy to do it.

Okay. So I'm going to just put in a couple of slightly more negative questions. We'll move back on the front foot after that. But I'm going to read this one.

In a sharp Chinese premium mass slowdown, how much property EBITDA can realistically come from non-gaming by 2028? What levers do you have to defend margins?

So I think for us, the business in Macau is driven by visitation, driven by gaming. And so if there's a material decline in visitation or material decline in gaming play like you saw in '23, that will impact the business and the margins.

So the downside case, we already went through. So you can actually see it in our results. 2019 was our best year on record. And then 2020 was one of our worst years of all time when the company had all its assets open, and we were forcibly closed and there was a global pandemic going on. And so I think there is variability within these downside cases and variability in the upside case. I think the great news is we continue to invest. The premium mass market is strong today, and there's more and more patrons that are new coming to Macau, and they're spending more money. And so I can't go through all the outcomes of a hypothetical because there will probably be many other things that would be true that aren't true today. But I will tell you, we feel very strongly about Macau and its future.

Okay. And you've talked, I think, and referenced the sort of ambition of EBITDA in Macau of $2.7 billion to $2.8 billion. What's the current pathway to get there? How much of that comes from revenue or margin expansion? And what kind of time frame could be looked at to get to that level?

So it's definitely going to come from revenue growth, right? It's going to come from us introducing products that are more able to address the demand of higher-value patrons because we're missing capacity in the premium -- in the most premium areas. And there's also some things we can do in the premium mass and actually in the base mass to optimize, and we're engaging and embarking on all those things.

But the key is going to be, like I said before, investment in our product, which we're going to do now and over the next 3 years. The Venetian is going under renovation right now as we speak. And over the next 18 months, we'll be getting rooms back online. They are newly renovated and it will be hopefully completed by the end of '27.

So that's a positive there. And then the rest of the things will happen along with that over the next 3 years. So that's the product side. The service side, we've been hiring people and training them, and we'll continue to do that. And I think the goal is to do this over the next few years. But it's going to require the market to continue to be the way that it is.

And hopefully, we'll add to the market growth by adding capacity and adding hiring patrons showing up, which will help grow the market. And so that's really our plan. It's something that we've done previously. I always joke with people. I said before the Venetian was built, gross gaming revenue on Cotai was 0, right? So it's a product-driven market. And so you have to build things that enable customers to show up and feel like they get great experiences and therefore, spend.

And then talk about expectations for the renewal of Macau licenses or changes to the framework.

So I think for us, the vision that Sheldon had about creating a Las Vegas in Macau and creating all this nongaming amenity has been very powerful. So we operate this huge MICE facility there. We had the first arena in Cotai. We have thousands of hotel rooms more than our competitors, and we have the largest retail portfolio and the largest restaurant portfolio. And these things create a critical mass of amenities that drive visitation and drive demand. And so one of the things that happened is during the midterm review for concessionaires, we got very positive marks for achieving the goals that were set out for us, including diversification of the economy and investment in working with small and medium enterprise and promotion of Macanese. And we have a lot of training programs. We do a lot of things that are helpful. We're also a good corporate citizen. We're the largest employer in Macau that's private, and we do a lot of things in the community. We do a lot of CSR events. We do a lot of things that show that we're part of the community, part of the fabric of the community there.

And so for us, the concession rule was something that we felt very strongly about because we wanted to continue to invest and follow the trajectory that we were doing. So we felt very good about it. We felt like we had a good thesis behind why we would get renewed, and we believe this will continue in the future, and that's why we continue to invest.

Does U.S.-Chinese relations matter at all to your business, right? If those -- if that sort of animosity between the 2 countries thaws, is that a positive? Or is it irrelevant?

So I think the good news is we've been in Macau for more than 20 years. And political things change over time. But hopefully, business and relationships and mutually beneficial exchange are durable.

And so I think the way we think about it is we, in Macau, are a local tourism company, right? We have a subsidiary listed on the Hong Kong Exchange. Our senior leadership is local, and our customers come from that area.

So -- and our largest trade partners are small and medium enterprise from that area. So for us, I think we sort of view it as, as long as we continue doing good things, we're in a good position. And then Singapore sits in a different environment. So it sits in Southeast Asia. So I think for us, as long as we continue doing the things that we've been doing, I think we're in a good position.

And just a final question on the topic. If you lifted Marina Bay Sands up and you put it in Macau, would it be the hotel that it is? Like is it the property that's spectacular? Or is it the Singapore market?

It's a combination of a lot of things that make it possible. The first being Singapore, the environment that is Singapore and the people who are in Singapore and the fact that it's a major financial center, it's a major trade center, and there's a lot of people who have been very successful who make Singapore their home or visit Singapore frequently.

And I think that market is very unique in that regard globally. And so I think having that building with that level of luxury, that level of experience, that level of aspiration is the perfect combination for what's there. It'd be very hard to be that productive outside of Singapore, just given the concentration of visitation for very high-value tourists into that market.

Makes sense. Okay. Let's move on to some slightly more techy stuff, I guess. But I asked this question last year to the new CEO. So let's ask you again, how are you thinking about online gaming? I guess you have a strong brand in gaming. Does it translate into online gaming at some point?

That's not something that we intend to pursue. We're very focused on doing the things that we're market leaders in. We think we're the market leader in Singapore and what we do. We think we're the market leader in Macau for what we do. We believe that we have a very strong argument to be made where there's -- if there's a new jurisdiction that wants to bring integrated resorts that we're someone that should be on the call list because we have the ability to really drive both leisure and business tourism and a demonstrated track record of building ground-up resorts that can achieve the objectives of the host markets.

So we feel like that's what we're really good at, and that's what we're going to stick to. And when we have excess capital, we're going to return it. And I don't think we're going to look to pursue things that are not in our core.

Would you ever license the brands to someone else to use for online gaming?

No. That would be.

No. Okay. Fair enough, easy one. What about -- so no online gaming, what about wider digital? Like is there -- smart tables or something you've been investing in? Is that product continuing to improve? Does AI have any role in gaming? Like is there further digital transformation even if it doesn't take the brands online?

So yes to both. We started investing in smart tables more than 8 years ago. Our solution that we run is a little bit different from some of the other solutions that other operators run. And the key for us is really a combination of RFID and optical. And that allows us to really be precise about the way that we understand what's happening at the table. I think the goal was really to get analytics to the point where it was almost as good as it was from a slot side, and it allows us to really understand what's happening in a much better way and actually better for the patron experience because we can rate them better and understand their behaviors better to make sure they have a better experience.

So in that regard, I think the investment that we've made in our smart tables has been very successful. And it's early days yet. We're still continuing to invest. We're continuing to innovate on the smart table systems that we have, and we're rolling more of them out.

Right now, they're in their early days in terms of how efficient they're making things, and we think there's a real opportunity to make our operations more secure, but also create a better patron experience in a more efficient way. So smart tables have been a great investment.

And the question about AI, so AI is changing the way people think about a lot of things, and it's something that we look at a lot. And I think there's a couple of things where it could change our business and impact our industry.

I think the easiest one is how you do information technology, right? That's sort of one of the fastest ones, right? How do you develop? How do you use it to create proprietary tools? How do you use it to think about the speed and really to be fair, the efficacy of what you create that's proprietary. And there's a lot of that in our industry, right? There's a lot of proprietary development that goes into what we do. So that's one. The other thing is how do you make your team more efficient, right? So there's a lot of efficiency tools that you get from some of the AI providers that you can get today that are actually quite useful, and they're early days yet. I mean these are things that you're starting to see, wow, if it does this, what can I do in a year. So that's very helpful.

And it's making our team more efficient and allows us to work better. But I think the biggest opportunity for us is business intelligence. The way we compile data, the way we think about our customers, and we think about the behavior of our customers and the way we learn about how we should interact with our customers by looking at our database and other bits of data that we collect, this is a new frontier for our industry, and it actually connects with the smart tables.

So for us, it's early days, but there's real potential there that we see in the future. It's not going to be right away because it's going to take a lot of work, but we're going. So we'll see. I think AI creates a real opportunity for businesses in a lot of different ways. But for me, the most important one is how we interact with our customer, how we attract new customers. I think a lot of things that you'll see is the way people actually book travel, right?

Think about Expedia, think about some of the early days of online and how that revolutionized travel and sort of opened it up and made it easier to understand what your options were. Now imagine having to do that through an agent and how quick that can be and how efficient that can be and what that could look like. And so that's another opportunity not only for our company, but for the travel industry as a whole.

Makes sense. I guess we're in the U.S. talking about gaming. So it was inevitable we're probably going to get one question on this. Prediction markets, any impact on physical gaming? Are you seeing any kind of cannibalization? Is there an opportunity that you can use that to complement table gaming in any way by using prediction markets?

So it's an interesting thing. I think it's early days for prediction markets because I don't know the legality of how they work has been settled, right? I think there's a lot of opinions going on that may be conflicting that may get things up to the Supreme Court.

So we'll have to see how that goes. But it's a very interesting idea. It's also a different concept than most people are used to. So when you typically would do sports wagering, you were facing the house, right? In this instance, you are facing somebody else.

And so it's very interesting to see the pricing dynamics, the margins that are available to the operators and any competitive advantage you may have or may not have given the nature of the product. And these are all things that need to be discovered. So we're watching it. We're trying to understand it. We are not in the sports wagering business. This isn't something that we intend to pursue, but it's interesting to watch and observe because it's tangential to our industry. So we'll continue to observe it and try to understand what the outcome will be.

You couldn't imagine offering prediction markets on what's happening within your casino sort of overlaying another layer of gaming on top of what's happening at the tables.

I'm always open to innovation. I'm just not sure how we would do that today. I will tell you that we're very focused on providing the best experiences to our customers. So if that's something that ends up being useful, we'll look at it. But I think for us, it's -- we provide very high-end luxury experiences to our customers, and that's a little different from being online.

Yes. And so there's no sports gaming in your casinos.

No.

There's not. It's all tables.

Correct.

Okay. Let's move on to capital allocation. So very high-margin business in the hospitality world. How do you balance that against faster growth? What do you think the priorities should be given how successful Singapore has been? Do you get sort of pressure to continue to funnel just more and more CapEx into that and keep growing that business as quick as you can?

So I think for us, in terms of capital allocation, we're moving as quickly as we can in Singapore to build IR2. I would love to have it open tomorrow, but we have a timeline, we're executing on the timeline.

In terms of investing in our existing assets, as I said before, the depreciation is real, and we continue to do that. You may note that in our last earnings call, we actually increased our forecast for maintenance CapEx in both of our portfolios over the long term to ensure that we continue to maintain the high level of finish that we have. I think our goal has always been to do ground-up development. So if you look at the highest level of returns that we've created for the company, it's when we build something from the ground up, right? Because we create properties that are very unique and drive a lot of visitation and create a lot of value. And if that's not available to us, so we have IR2, we have some renovations going on in Macau. But if that's not available to us, our goal is to return capital to shareholders. So we try to be a very shareholder-friendly company. We have a dividend that is at an appropriate payout ratio, and we have a share repurchase program that is active and is looking to shrink the share count to create better shareholder returns and create more free cash flow per share.

So from my standpoint, capital allocation is very much based on can we do new ground-up development? Can we grow our business? Can we get organic growth through investments? How do we need to maintain our properties to ensure our leadership position? And then if we don't have an appropriate return project to pursue, we return it.

And so talk to us about where appropriate returning projects could manifest themselves. I think in prior years when we sat here, a little bit of talk about the U.S. Is that still an opportunity? Thailand has been talked about as an opportunity. Are there other

markets you can imagine LVS going into over the years?

So I think Texas presents itself as the best opportunity in the U.S. currently that hasn't been open. I think the propensity to play is known. If you look at some of the surrounding markets and where Texans go, it's not in Texas. So I think the state of Texas has an opportunity there.

And we would look to invest there if the framework was right. And I think it's very clear that the cities in Texas are some of the largest economies in the world on their own, right? And without destination resorts in Texas, there's a missed opportunity, particularly for tourism and for tax recapture, direct -- foreign direct investment, economic multiplier. Texas should be, in my mind, this is something they should be pursuing. And I think there's a lot of people who feel the same.

But I also think that there's not an opportunity today. So it may be a few years. So if it's something that presents itself and the framework is right, it's something that we'd be very interested in. We've always been interested in Thailand. We feel like it's just a fantastic market. We have customers that come there. We're very familiar with it. It's a wonderful tourism destination. It has a great hospitality culture, has wonderful history, great cultural sites and just fantastic cuisine. There's a lot of great things happening in Thailand. So if that was a market that we would be able to pursue, we'd be very interested. But right now, it doesn't seem like anything is doing. So hopefully, in the future, we'll have that opportunity, but we're ever hopeful.

What's the barrier there, is just licenses? Just...

Legalization.

And in Texas, the barrier is the same?

Legalization.

Legalization. That's simply as it is it seems getting that. And -- the question here, does the growth in Middle East in gaming represent a step-up in competition for you? Have you ever looked at the Middle East as a potential market?

So I'm familiar with the Middle East. I've been to the Emirates numerous times. I'm a big fan of what they're doing from a hospitality standpoint. I think they have great investments there. The hospitality environment there is great. They have great food and beverage and nightlife. And so gaming is new there. And so I think we're watching and waiting. It's great for our industry if they're very successful because I think our industry needs to experience some growth and need to have new markets. And so I think it'd be a positive thing for all of us if they're very successful in that market. And so we'd like to see how it goes.

And in terms of sort of pursuing potential other opportunities, that would be purely on a returns basis, if that's the best opportunity. But is there a strategy we would like to see more diversification in the business as well? -- is it just to be in the right markets? Is diversification an aim in any respect?

I think it would be great if we could have more markets open. I think it would have a natural diversification. I think it would allow us to have more cash flow to return to shareholders, but I also think returns are really important. There's a lot of opportunities that have lower return profiles for Las Vegas Sands, but we'd rather stick to the assets that we have if those -- if higher returns are not available.

Yes. Okay. Makes sense. And then just -- I think my last question here is the balance of buying more Sands China versus buying LVS shares and paying dividends, how do you think about what's the best stock to buy back?

I think we're really interested in growing the dividend at Sands China. And I think we're really interested in having the balance of return of capital that we have that you see today at Las Vegas Sands. And some of that is structural. There's less liquidity in the market in Hong Kong. And so share repurchases are -- could be more structurally difficult from time to time, whereas we think the dividend also makes the stock much more attractive to Hong Kong-based investors.

So we think there's a couple of reasons why the dividend is more interesting there than it is at ParentCo.

We think ParentCo in the long run, will get rewarded by shrinking the share count.

Okay. That makes sense. All right. Patrick, thanks for joining us today. Appreciate it. Thank you.

Thanks so much. Appreciate it.

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Sands First Quarter 2026 Earnings Call. [Operator Instructions]. It is now my pleasure to turn the floor over to Mr. Daniel Briggs, Senior Vice President of Investor Relations at Sands. Sir, the floor is yours.

Thank you. Joining the call today are Patrick Dumont, our Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; Dr. Wilfred Wong; Executive Vice Chairman of Sands China; and Grant Chum, CEO and President of Sands China and EVP of Asia Operations.

Today's conference call will contain forward-looking statements. We will be making those statements under the safe harbor provision of federal securities laws. The language on forward-looking statements included in our press release also applies to our comments made on the call today.

The company's actual results may differ materially from the results reflected in those forward-looking statements. In addition, we will discuss non-GAAP measures. Reconciliations to the most comparable GAAP financial measures are included in our press release. We have posted an earnings presentation on our website. We will refer to that presentation during the call. Finally, for the Q&A session, we ask those with interest to please post 1 question and 1 follow-up, so we might allow everyone with interest the opportunity to participate. This presentation is being recorded.

I'll now turn the call over to Patrick.

Thanks, Dan. Good afternoon. Thank you for joining the call. As we look to the future, we couldn't be more enthusiastic about the opportunities for our company. Our strategic priorities remain clear and consistent with the goals of investing with discipline and creating meaningful shareholder returns.

Turning to our current quarter results. we once again delivered outstanding financial results of Marina Bay Sands in Singapore with EBITDA increasing over 30% to reach $788 million. Singapore is an ideal market for high-value tourism spending and our focus on creating unique and memorable entertainment and hospitality experiences for our guests has been a tremendous success.

The company's fundamental operating strategy relies on 3 critical pillars: our people, our product and our service. When we get these 3 pillars optimized, we can create outstanding financial and operating performance. We are seeing that at Marina Bay Sands today. and we couldn't be more enthusiastic about our additional opportunities for growth in Singapore as we continue to enhance the customer experience for our guests in the years ahead.

Turning to Macao. We delivered $633 million in EBITDA for the quarter. an increase of over 18%. Mass market revenue share reached 25.7% for this quarter, our strongest performance since the first quarter of 2024. As in Singapore, the operating pillars of people, product and service underpin our strategy to deliver growth in Macao. We believe we will deliver growth over time in Macao as we implement specific strategies to improve both our products and our service levels.

We have a goal of reaching $700 million in quarterly EBITDA and beyond over time as we fully implement our investment and operating strategies and as the Macao market continues to grow. Today, the growth in the Macao market is primarily driven by the premium segment. The competition in that segment remains intense, and luxury suite product, coupled with outstanding service levels are critical to success. We have the suite product to effectively compete in the premium segment at both Londoner and Grand Suites at the Four Seasons. We are singularly focused today on matching that suite of room product with the service levels at the most discerning and valuable customers and Macao increasingly demand.

We are making progress. We have meaningfully increased our gaming revenues, gaming volumes and premium customer patronage since implementing the recent changes to our reinvestment programs. implementing meaningful improvements in the service pillar of our strategy in Macao will be critical to realizing additional growth and securing our long-term success. We believe we have outstanding opportunities for growth in every segment as we implement our strategies.

Accordingly, we will be making targeted investments in training and hiring of additional customer-focused team members throughout the portfolio. Creating and delivering unique and memorable hospitality experiences is the [indiscernible] piece of our strategy and improving service levels in Macao is critical to the achievement of our long-term financial and operating objectives. In addition, we plan to introduce refreshed and luxurious room and suite products throughout the portfolio as we further execute the pillar of our -- the product pillar of our strategy.

We are focused on the highest return projects to increase cash flow over the next few years. We will begin with the Venetian where work is already in progress with refreshed room products beginning to come into service in the third quarter of 2026. Additional luxurious suite product and the total product refresh is targeted to be completed by the end of 2027.

The meaningful patron growth we have seen in the London and Grand Suites in the Four Seasons provides support for these investments. It's important to note that the work we envision will not create significant disruption throughout the portfolio. The scale of our portfolio will allow us to serve customers in other properties and elsewhere in each resort while work is in progress. Nothing we are doing, as we invest in the portfolio over the next several years will hinder our ability to use our scale advantages to outperform the nonpremium segment should spending in that segment accelerate in the future.

We are confident in our strategy in Macao, and we look forward to updating you on our progress as we execute our plans.

Let's move forward to provide some additional detail on our current quarter financial performance. Macao EBITDA was $633 million. If we had held as expected in our rolling program, our EBITDA would have been lower by $15 million. When adjusted for a higher-than-expected hold in the rolling segment, our EBITDA margin for the Macao portfolio of properties would have been 29.6% or down 200 basis points compared to the first quarter of 2025.

Our principal focus in 2026 is to deliver revenue and cash flow growth across the portfolio. Our investments in improving service offerings will naturally increase expenses, which will continue to negatively impact margins as we implement our strategy. We do expect margins to improve over time as we grow revenue in the lower end of the premium segment and in the nonpremium segment, where the scale of our hotel inventory gives us natural advantages as we improve our service levels and further refine our reinvestment strategies.

Margin for the quarter at the Venetian was 33.5%, while margin at the Londoner was 29.6%. We expect growth in EBITDA as revenues grow. We will use our scale and product advantages together with service level improvements and targeted incentives to effectively compete in every market segment. In Singapore, Marina Bay Sands EBITDA for the quarter was $788 million at a margin of 53%. If we had held as expected in our program, our EBITDA would have been higher by $6 million. The outstanding financial and operating results in MBS reflect the impact of high-quality investment in market-leading product, world-class service and the growth in high-value tourism.

Turning to our program to return capital to shareholders. We repurchased $740 million of LVS stock during the quarter. We also paid our recurring quarterly dividend of $0.30 per share. We have now purchased 14.3% of the company's outstanding shares over the last 10 quarters, and we believe additional repurchases of LVS equity through our share repurchase program will be meaningfully accretive to the company and its shareholders over the long time. While we did not purchase any shares of SCL during the quarter, we do continue to see value in both the LVS and SCL names.

The company's ownership of SCL remained at 74.8% as of March 31, 2026. We look forward to continuing to utilize the company's share repurchase program to increase returns to shareholders. Thanks again for joining the call today and for your interest in the company. Now let's take some questions.

[Operator Instructions] And the first question today is coming from Dan Politzer from JPMorgan.

Singapore has gone from strength to strength to strength. I think you had $18 billion of rolling ships in the quarter. I mean I guess, how do you think about what's driving this? I mean, it's just kind of the astronomical levels here? And to what extent are you seeing any benefit from some of the things kind of evolving the geopolitical landscape that may be hitting other regions and possibly benefiting Sagamore?

So there's a couple of things about the Marina Bay Sands growth story, which is really a story about investment. The more we invest in high-quality assets, better service levels we have the more we're going to differentiate the product that we have and the more high-value visitation we're going to get.

Look, I think the VIP segment is just a very competitive segment across Asia. The fact that we're able to see success here with these very high-value patrons is really just an example of the execution there at the property. I will tell you that our main driver of profitability at Marina Bay Sands is mass win in [ Flox ]. VIP is a very volatile segment. And it could be concentrated at times. It's high-value customers, and they can vary from quarter-to-quarter.

What I will tell you is that with the introduction of IR 2, we will have more product to address this market and scale with it. But the one thing to note is that we had an outstanding quarter. Team did a phenomenal job, but these quarters can be highly concentrated and can vary.

And then just turning to Macao. You mentioned the goal to get back to that $700 million in quarterly EBITDA level. Obviously, it's going to require a little bit more investment. But I mean in terms of the market growth that you have to get there, I mean, how -- at what level do you have to see the overall market or mass grow? Or is that something you can kind of get to or achieve independent of the market really accelerating here?

Look, I think we're heading in the right direction in Macao. I think you see the growth this quarter, and you see that our focus on service and improving our product. We have some work to do there across the portfolio, as we mentioned, is starting to show some progress. And so in our mind, that's a milestone that's achievable. Obviously, it's going to require some growth in the overall market. But more importantly, it's going to require us to continue on the execution of hospitality and service that we're showing. Brad, do you have anything else to add?

First of all, the market continues to grow. We had 14% growth year-on-year this quarter. And it's notable that we achieved significant revenue outperformance against each segment. So we gained share in every single segment, both on a year-on-year basis as well as sequentially. So we achieved the EBITDA growth as well as sequential margin improvement at the same time as we optimize our reimbursement levels.

The next question will be from Brandt Montour from Barclays.

So over in Singapore, you have a slide that you show us the theoretical rolling hold. And I know that, that's just sort of a pure statistical output from betting mix. But you kind of do show it kind of curling over and sort of reverting back lower. I just want to make sure, like do you -- are you guys seeing a change in betting behavior or any type of reversion away from side bets or the sort of long bets that you've talked about? .

Yes. I appreciate the question. The VIP business is very volatile and there's an interesting occurrence in the way patrons play now, which is some customers who are high-end VIP customers on rolling programs play traditional bets, and they bet in a much more traditional conservative way. And then we have other patrons who really enjoy the volatility and side bets that we present. And so when you have like on Page 12, if you look at the third quarter of '25, where we hit the peak of 4.2 with $9.1 billion in rolling volume, we had patrons in the building who really love those side bets. And so it drove the theoretical hire. .

In the case of this quarter with $18 billion of rolling volume, it was a barbell. We had people in the building who were [ getting ] the traditional bets in a very conservative manner and rolling a lot of volume. And then on the other side, we had some people who were really playing the side bets. And so the way we got to 3.6% was a more traditional VIP hold mixed with people who are taking advantage of the side bets and having a more, let's call it, modern approach to the game. And so what you ended up was this 3.6%. But it was not like an average of play. It really was a barbell.

Okay. That's really helpful. And then a second question would be on Macao. The base mass is not where most of the growth appears to be coming in the broader industry right now. And I'm just curious if you guys are starting to see any green shoots in that customer just given we've seen a little bit of better stock market and maybe some other green shoots in the macro, but just anything that you guys check or watching from what you -- sort of KPIs and things that you watch on the macro level that gives you any sort of confidence or incremental confidence in that segment. .

Thanks for the question. The market growth is driven by premium segments, both in rolling and non-rolling segments, but we can point to a couple of indicators to show that the base asset and the mass growth is actually solid. If you look at not so much the base mass tables, but the slot and [ ETG ] segment, we are seeing strong growth as a whole in the market and Sands China outperformed the market in that segment by a significant margin this quarter. So our slot in ETG segment grew by 31% year-on-year and 10% sequentially, especially driven by our more mass orientated properties in Parisian and Sands, where you can see the slightly ETG number has grown tremendously.

The second indicator is our retail business. We actually hit a quarterly all-time high in tenant sales in this first quarter, which is an exceptional performance. Our tenant sales grew by 37%. Yes, it was driven by the jewelry and watch sector but the spending was very broad across all of our malls. And we also saw significant growth in the fashion segment as well. So from the slot segment, from the retail mall, you can see that consumption is solid. But clearly, for the GGR, the premium segment is still driving the majority of the growth.

The next question will be from Robin Farley from UBS.

Just circling back, Patrick, you were making comments about Singapore, and you talked about both VIP and mass. And then you said something like IR2 will give us more product to address that. Did you -- were you suggesting that IR2 will be focusing on one or the other of those markets? Or did you just mean that broadly product to address the Singapore market? Sorry, I just want a clarification on that. And then I do have a follow-up.

Yes, no problem. Thanks for asking a follow-up on IR2. In our mind, this will be the most luxurious and most highly amenity hotel in the world. And our intention is to set a new standard for luxury hospitality, which will naturally attract very high-end patrons, some of whom are gaming patrons on rolling programs. And so my comments around the volatility and concentrated nature of the VIP play that we see in Marina Bay Sands, in our mind, can be smooth a little bit by having more inventory to bring in more of these very high-value patrons. And so while IR2 will not be focused solely on VIP patrons, it's really going to be for all the high-value tourists that we have coming into our building. But it's really going to set a new standard and those types of customers tend to gravitate to those types of hospitality and amenity environment.

It will also have an unbelievable entertainment component, which we believe will also appeal to the highest value tourists that we have -- high-value patrons we have coming into [indiscernible]. So we hope that, that gives us additional inventory and strength at the highest levels of patron rating.

Great. Helpful. And just a follow-up on Singapore in general. I don't know if you have any thoughts about how we should think about the 2 properties and what combined EBITDA might look like or incremental EBITDA from IR2? Any sort of -- I know it's early big picture.

I think for us, we're really looking to get our targeted return on invested capital across the total investment. So we've always said that we kind of target a 20% return. So that's kind of where we're trying to get to. And if you look at the productivity that we're seeing out of our highest end products within Marina Bay Sands, that we believe that this is achievable. And that's why we're investing in the project. The market is very unique. The tourists that are coming into the market, the structural tailwinds that are supporting growth in Singapore. The value of the single port has demonstrated a the tourism destination, the fact that we're going to have an arena now that we control that will have some of the best presentation technology in the world.

We're very excited about the opportunity there. So we think it will enhance not only the experience you would have at IR2 but the type of guests we have coming across the portfolio because what it will bring in terms of additional amenities. So for us, we're looking at a total project return in excess of the 20% we talked about.

And the next question will be from Stephen Grambling from Morgan Stanley.

And this is maybe digging into some of the questions on Marina Bay Sands. Can you maybe just talk about how the customer concentration may have evolved over time? Are you actually getting more customers? And is the comment about having being able to attract the highest end customer, meaning that you're hitting some kind of threshold where you just don't have enough space for some of these customers? Or is it just that you're getting more play out of individual and you haven't seen any kind of upper bound on that?

We went from 132 suites to 770, and we need more capacity. And so we're -- we wish we're going to IR2 tomorrow. I think for us, the result -- there was a sea change in a way that we presented our products [indiscernible]. You hear us talk about the quality of the design, our design excellence initiatives and our design team had done outstanding work. The service levels there extraordinary. Our hospitality team has really stepped up. Our culinary efforts have really improved over time.

Our nightlife is really accelerating. And so with the strength in our retail business there, we really have so many amenities that just drive the highest value tourists from the region to Singapore and to our property. And we are able to use a lot more capacity when it becomes available. And so I think for us, we're looking at IR2 as a way to really increase the high-end suites that we have, add amenities across the portfolio that we don't have today in terms of entertainment, additional ballrooms, additional culinary, additional science to be seen. And so for us, this is something that we hope will have a multiplier effect on what we have on offer there, and we need more capacity.

And yes, where we made the change, we started bringing in much higher value tourists into Singapore and to our building, but there's more of them. And so for us, we're looking forward to the opportunity to grow to take advantage of what we see as the market opportunity.

That's helpful. And maybe one follow-up, but just on Macao. I think you mentioned some of the investments going on there. Can you just remind us of some of the timing of some of the renovations and work that you're doing and how you're thinking about where to invest based on what you're seeing in the market now?

So a couple of things I'll highlight, and then I'll turn it over to Grant. I think for us, we have a very strong fundamental view for the long-term success of Macao. And our company has been built from Sheldon's original vision that investment and scale creates a competitive advantage. And what you see in Macao today is even though the market is hypercompetitive in certain segments that we continue to perform in those segments with high-quality product and the right service levels and the right marketing.

And so for us, we're going to look to invest in our portfolio. So we do have scale. We do have rooms. We do have amenities. We do have retail. We do have entertainment, to invest in a way that will give us the maximum opportunity to take advantage of what we see as growth in segments that we're getting the benefit of today. And so I think the next couple of years, you'll see us invest in certain areas that we think we've underinvested in over the last 5 years and an attempt to reposition some of our assets to better address the market today and make us more competitive. Grant, would you like to add anything?

Sure. We can see exceptional results from our new product throughout the last 3 to 4 quarters. So part of our market share gain is a function not just of our reinvestment strategies but also the ramp-up of Londoner Grand. So you can see that very clearly in our results. And of course, for seasons with the Grand Suites product is also very competitive.

Looking forward, we have said, I think, in Patrick's opening remarks, we're starting the renovation of the Venetian. This is our flagship property and we are very excited by the upcoming transformation of the Venetian. This will deliver new inventory progressively starting in the second half of this year, the standard suites will start coming back and then progressively work our way towards the high-end suites and the villas into 2027, and then the entire project should finish by the end of '27 or early 2028.

The next question will be from Lizzie Dove from Goldman Sachs.

So it looks like the buyback stepped up a little bit this quarter. I'm just curious, especially as you see this continued inflection of Singapore EBITDA going from strength to strength. Is this an appropriate kind of quarterly run rate? Or how do you think about capital returns more broadly longer term?

So I think we said for a long time, we see significant value both LVS and SCL equity. And we're going to continue repurchasing shares. We thought this quarter represented a significant opportunity where levels were. So we were a little more aggressive than maybe you've seen in prior quarters. But our goal is to continue to repurchase shares in a meaningful way.

We think it's an important part of our return of capital strategy, and it's something that really creates long-term value for our shareholders over time. So you see the share count reduction over the last couple of years. It's very meaningful, and we're going to continue to look at that direction as we think about return on capital.

Got it. And then just as we think about Macao, for the rest of the year, we're only a couple of months away from comp starting to get a little bit tougher. Obviously, you're making progress on the margin side with that sequential uptick. But just how do you think about your ability to kind of keep improving on that, especially as the comps get a little tougher going forward?

Thanks for the question. First of all, the revenue growth is an important factor. Over time, we expect higher revenues will drive margin improvement. Outside of that, we are investing heavily, as Patrick referenced, in improving our service offerings across our operating capacity, across our sales force, distribution and also, importantly, into our hospitality and gaming service levels.

So those initiatives do -- are having an impact on the cost structure and will continue to impact the margin in the near term. At the same time, we are driving revenue growth. We're achieving revenue share gains and over time, we intend to grow margin as the revenue levels continue to increase.

In terms of the reinvestment levels, we have been able to spend less on reinvestment relative to revenue on a sequential basis. We see at least in our strategy and our ability to optimize stabilization in the reinvestment levels. The market continues to be very competitive. So we have to continue to monitor the dynamics very carefully. But for this quarter, we were able to achieve both revenue growth and sequential stabilization and improvement in our reinvestment strategy.

The next question will be from Chad Beynon from Macquarie.

Two questions on Macao. One, I just wanted to ask about how the entertainment calendar looks maybe through the rest of the year at [ Cotai Arena ] and then at some of the smaller venues? And then my second question is more around just the sentiment with the base mass customer, really good growth in the first quarter, as we've talked about a couple of times and particular growth in the Chinese stock market and just overall what we're able to see kind of consumer sentiment indicators. But are you getting any different sense from your customers since the tensions in the Middle East has started? Or do you think most of the base mass customer.

Chad, you've got a lot going on there.

Answer all these questions. You don't have to ask like 9 questions in one. Let's just regiment little segments and we'll get some of all, I promise. .

First on the entertainment calendar, and I'll stop there.

I just want to say, first off, I appreciate all the questions. One thing about the entertainment calendar. We've been investing in entertainment assets for years in Macao, and we feel that entertainment is a great way to drive inbound tourism into Macao from both China and actually from the surrounding region. And we're very happy to have some uptick in tourism from outside of Macao coming in. And we think over time, entertainment is an important component of that. .

We also feel like entertainment is a great way to show off the quality of our assets and the quality of the experiences that you can have at our portfolio of properties. And so we've been really focused on not only investing in our entertainment assets. So you saw our renovation of the arena that allowed us to have the NBA games. But also other things that we're doing around the portfolio to enhance the customer experience with our entertainment assets, including programming. So I did want to address that just in terms of the physical asset side. And now I'd ask Grant to comment on the calendar.

The calendar was strong in first quarter for us, which at our performance. We did 11 to 12 shows during the quarter. If you look at the pacing of the calendar, like Patrick said, we will continue to use entertainment content as a driver for the resort visitation. And it helps us across every segment of the patron value chain. We do see that the big [indiscernible] have slowed down in the Asian tour stops this year versus the prior immediate 2 years. However, we have the ability to bring content of different size, different spectatorship because we have access to both the Venetian Arena, which is the bigger arena as well as the midsized London Arena. So we're able to bring a more diverse range of ag and content because we do have the scale on the performance venues, which is an attraction for different artists and promoters because being able to access high-quality venues at different times of the year is not always easy.

So we do have an advantage in a number of x and artists in the region where we can offer them best-in-class and different range of performance venues all the way from the Venetian arena to London arena and then also to our performance status.

And in regards to the mass gaming, I think you've seen 30% growth year-over-year in the overall market. I think for us, that just speaks to the attractiveness of the assets on the market, liquidity, accessibility and just the overall growth in demand, which I think has been super helpful for us. Grant, I don't know if there's anything else you want to bring up on or to mass I think that's it. .

I think that is it.

Okay. And then you were going to ask us about Middle East disruption? Was that your next one?

Yes. Just we think that the Chinese customer can power through in the same way that we're seeing a U.S. customer, given where oil prices are and how that all factors into sentiment. .

The way to think about this is the number of options available to the outbound Chinese visitor. If you look at the options available today versus 3 months ago, 6 months ago. The reality is destinations that are closer to home are going to gain share in general as a result of the current environment for all sorts of reasons that you're familiar with. So the net effect from a demand standpoint, is, I think, a positive one for both Macao and Singapore because these destinations are going to be more desirable and not preferred during the current geopolitical and also the cost of air travel, all of those factors put together in this environment right now, the short-haul destinations, especially ones of this appeal in Macao and Singapore are going to be more popular with the Chinese market.

The next question will be from George Joy from Citigroup.

Just a quick one from me. Based on the numbers that you are seeing right now, how do you compare the popularity of best amongst your Macao players versus Singapore? And will you guys to use more new cyber options in Macao.

You are normally -- the first one to notice on new sites. We have introduced some new Siege options in Macao over the past week. In terms of your question about popularity, it remains true that the take-up of [indiscernible], especially as a percentage of total wages is much higher still in Marina Bay Sands than in Macao. That said, the take-up of side wages in Macao is increasing the propensity to wager on these side wages we do see a progressive trend upwards. And I think the introduction of these [indiscernible] that we'll be implementing now and in the next few months, will further enhance that propensity.

The next question will be from Joe Stauff from SFG.

For MBS, I wanted to follow up maybe on the rolling chip volume, just an absolutely huge number in the quarter. I'm wondering the volatility associated with this, is it visitations and what those visitations will do in terms of volume? What is easier for you to program I guess, between the 2? And was there a particular -- and the follow-up is, was there a particular reason maybe in the first quarter that drove higher visitation from this clientele versus, say, other quarters?

So the VIP segment is volatile. It can be concentrated and it depends on who shows up when. And so it is about visitation and it's about bringing the highest value patrons we have who want to be on a rolling program into the building. And so the great news is we have long-standing relationships with historical customers. We have new customers coming into the building, and they love our service, they love the hotel suites they get, they love the food, entertainment, they love going to the retail.

So it's really a total experience proposition and then they show up and they play. And so for us, it's about having the right amenities to satisfy these very discerning customers and just getting them into the building.

The next question will be from Trey Bowers from Wells Fargo. .

I guess just one on CapEx. The maintenance CapEx and the SCL level CapEx in the slide deck moved up for the next couple of years. Is that maybe just one, you guys are doing so well. So why not kind of reinvest a little more aggressively? And then two, is it a pull-forward concession. Just curious on those 2 numbers. Or is it also some of the things you guys referenced around like Venetian rehab?

So one of the industry grades a long time ago said that depreciation is real in our business. And we have to spend money to maintain our positioning and to grow. And so we are doing a full portfolio review to make sure that we're deploying capital in the most efficient way and the highest return projects to generate cash flow growth. And so this increase in CapEx is based on -- our expectation is that if we invest more, we will grow more.

Perfect. And one other question. The promotional activity in Macao looks like it ticked down a little bit sequentially. Could we kind of assume that -- you guys really ramped in Q4. It's higher year-over-year again in Q1, but it's getting better. As we look forward is just kind of the stickiness you guys are seeing from early promotional activity, demanding less of it as we go forward. And should that be one of the factors that's helping out this drive towards that 700 number.

We've been able to optimize some of our programs, having started to change our reinvestment programming and approach since the middle of 2025. So this is a natural progression as we change our programs, we assess what worked was less effective and great credit to the team who were able to achieve good optimization in this quarter, whilst continue to gain market share and grow revenue.

We are also able to optimize the reinvestment level because we'd be more successful in leveraging our product advantage. So we've been able to ramp up Londoner Grand, especially and that has helped us tremendously in -- especially in the core premium mass, mid-tier segments growing the customer base there, and that speaks to the CapEx and the upgrading of product referenced by Patrick that as we review the portfolio, there are going to be other significant opportunities for us to invest for growth. And at the same time, growing, it also allows us to be more targeted and disciplined in reinvestment as these products come online.

The next question will be from Steve Wieczynski from Stifel.

So Patrick, sorry, I'm going to ask another question about the -- getting to $700 million a quarter in Macao. So obviously, there's a lot of promotional activity taking place right now in the market. So I guess the question is, to get to $700 million eventually in EBITDA, does that assume your competitors pull back so-called aggressively on promotions? Or saying that differently, does that assume more of a normalized promotional environment from, I guess, not only yourselves but also your competitors as well?

No, actually, we're sort of thinking about that in the context of current conditions. It's more about -- if you look at the growth that we experienced in Q1, it's a very competitive market. But I think the market is growing. And I think we're also helping to grow the market with the high-quality assets that we have. So for us, when we think about $700 million, it's about continuing to invest, having the right marketing programs, utilizing our assets more efficiently. It'd be helpful if the market grows a little bit, the additional growth in the market and expansion of GGR market [indiscernible] is helpful. But we think that it's in the context of the current conditions.

Okay. Got you. And then kind of sticking with that, Patrick. Look, I know you guys don't give guidance, but is it -- based on what you just said there, is it kind of a -- is it fair to think that this sort of run rate of, let's call it, $600 million a quarter in Macao is probably the right way to think about the market for the foreseeable future until that base mass business really does return?

Yes. I think the one thing I just want to be careful about is there is seasonality in our business. I know you know that. And second quarter is typically our softest and just sequential comparisons between Q1 and Q2, given that we have Chinese New Year and Q1 are always tough and sometimes not that helpful. .

Well, just directionally, we'd like to believe that we're in a really solid place as we continue to grow our business and make the right moves in terms of marketing, in terms of utilizing our assets. But that's kind of how we think about it.

The next question will be from David Katz from Jefferies.

Can we just talk about the Venetian a little bit and the degree to which again, I know you don't give guidance, but the degree to which we should be factoring in some disruption as you go through that room renovation? And any qualitative perspective would be helpful.

Thank you for the question. No, we don't expect meaningful disruption impact, we'll be balancing the out of inventory with the businesses, and we are able to redistribute the demand throughout the rest of the portfolio. And at the same time, new rooms will continuously be coming back to the active inventory starting from the third quarter. So even as total number of keys will be reduced modestly during this period, we are going to be benefiting from brand new suites coming online over the coming quarters, especially when the multi-based suites come back online towards the back end of 2027.

Understood. And as my follow-up, I know we've touched on this just a bit, but maintenance CapEx, we usually think about in the context of nondiscretionary versus projects that can be decided upon and moved around, understand every company's perspective on it is different, but just noticing in the deck that should we think about that $500 million number as something that is nondiscretionary, and how did that come about?

First off, we believe that it is necessary to maintain our business. So it's split between Marina Bay Sands and Sands China. But we just want to be realistic about what we believe we need to spend going forward to ensure our buildings are kept in the best possible condition to maximize our cash flow. And so we don't view this as optional. We view this as something that's a responsible move to take care of our buildings into the future. .

And the next question will be from John DeCree from CBRE.

I know we've covered the topic of OpEx in Macao a little bit, but maybe just to round it out, if you could provide a little cover maybe coming out of from a modeling angle. So are we expecting kind of the investment in service you've talked about to kind of grow in line with revenue. Are these going to be kind of fixed cost people coming online more staff and will happen regardless of which way revenue goes? Or is it kind of something that you'll kind of time throughout the year as revenue increases at different paces, you'll have service levels. Just trying to get a sense of how much fixed costs are maybe coming in this year versus variable depending on revenue?

These are hires that are designed to increase and enhance the service levels of our buildings. So ideally, as we grow revenue because we're bringing in higher value patrons, we get some scale or some operating leverage across these fixed costs, but they're primarily payroll. We're adding people in certain areas to service certain patron tiers to enhance their experience and make sure that we're at the highest standards for service. And so this hiring in our mind is actually beneficial because while we have to hire and train these people and add them to our team so that we can accomplish our goals and providing leading hospitality in the market. Combined with the investments and the renovations that we're doing, this will put us in a better position to grow because you need the people and you need the physical product in order to provide the patrons experience that allows you to differentiate and draw the highest value customers and to our buildings. And so this is an investment in the future.

Got it. Maybe just a quick follow-up on that. So the new hires, and apologies a little granular, but kind of on a rolling basis going forward? Or have they already been hired I guess when should we think about the lion's share of the additional staff coming online? .

A significant number of actually -- are actually in the OpEx now. So we have people joining our staff and -- so actually, there's -- some of that's actually in the margin today, some of the additional payroll associated with the service enhancement. And it will continue to be added over the next couple of quarters.

Thank you. That concludes today's Q&A session, and it also concludes today's conference call. You may disconnect your lines at this time, and have a wonderful day. We thank you for your participation.

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Sands Fourth Quarter 2025 Earnings Call. [Operator Instructions]

It is now my pleasure to turn the floor over to Mr. Daniel Briggs, Senior Vice President of Investor Relations at Sands. Sir, the floor is yours.

Thank you. Joining the call today are Rob Goldstein, our Chairman and CEO; Patrick Dumont, our President and Chief Operating Officer; Dr. Wilfred Wong, Executive Vice President, Sands China; and Grant Chum, CEO and President of Sands China and EVP of Asia operations.

Today's conference call will contain forward-looking statements. We will be making those statements under the safe harbor provision of federal securities laws. The language on forward-looking statements included in our press release also applies to our comments made on the call. The company's actual results may differ materially from the results reflected in those forward-looking statements.

In addition, we will discuss non-GAAP measures. Reconciliations to the most comparable GAAP financial measures are included in our press release. We have posted an earnings presentation on our website. We will refer to that presentation during the call. Finally, for the Q&A session, we ask those with interest to please post 1 question and 1 follow on so we might allow everyone with interest the opportunity to participate. This presentation is being recorded.

I'll now turn the call over to Rob.

Thank you, Dan, and good afternoon. Thank you for joining us. Marina Bay Sands delivered EBITDA of $806 million, simply the greatest quarter in the history of casino hotels. We see $2.9 billion of EBITDA this year. Mass gaming and [ spot win ] exceeded $951 million this quarter, which is up 118% in Q4 in 2019, up 27% in Q4 last year. Of course, we are delighted with the results, we look forward to more this year.

This is an extraordinary market we have built a product to maximize the opportunity. The question is how much further can we go in the next 2 years. There's has never been a building to my knowledge to deliver these types of results.

Macao delivered $608 million of EBITDA for the quarter, and we are disappointed with that EBITDA number. However, mass market revenue did exceeded 25% this quarter of share, up 23.6% in the first quarter of 2025. Macao market is driven by the premium segment which is a highly competitive market. There may be a day when base mass recovers, and we will excel when that day comes, but until then, we will continue to focus on our ability to make the assets work harder to achieve $700 million per quarter. The team is in the right place, and we will deliver better results in 2026.

So let's hear it from Patrick.

Thanks, Rob. Macao EBITDA was $608 million. If we had held as expected in our rolling program, our EBITDA would have been lower by $26 million. When adjusted for higher-than-expected hold of the rolling segment, our EBITDA margin for the Macao portfolio of properties would have been 28.9%, down 390 basis points compared to the fourth quarter of 2024.

We are focused on delivering revenue and cash flow growth across the portfolio. Margin at the Venetian was 32.3%, while margin at the Londoner was 28.8%. We expect growth in EBITDA as revenue to grow. We will use our scale and product advantages together with targeted incentives to better address every market segment. We see opportunity in every segment at every property in the portfolio.

In Singapore, Marina Bay Sands EBITDA for the quarter was $806 million at a margin of 50.3%. If we had held as expected in our rolling program, our EBITDA would have been lower by $45 million. The record financial results at MBS reflect the impact of high-quality investment in market-leading product, world-class service and the growth in high-value tourism.

Turning to our program to return capital to shareholders. We repurchased $500 million of LVS stock during the quarter. We also paid our recurring quarterly dividend of $0.25 per share. We believe repurchases of LVS equity through our share repurchase program will be meaningfully accretive to the company and its shareholders over the long term.

During the fourth quarter, we purchased $66 million of SCL stock, increasing the company's ownership percentage of SCL to 74.8% as of December 31, 2025. We continue to see value in both names. We look forward to continuing to utilize the company's share repurchase program to increase returns to shareholders.

Thanks again for joining the call today. Now let's take questions.

[Operator Instructions] The first question today is coming from Dan Politzer from JPMorgan.

And Rob, congrats on the storied career at Las Vegas Sands. We'll definitely miss hearing your honest assessment of what's going on in the markets across the world.

First, on Singapore -- yes. Another, obviously, a real strong quarter here. I mean the VIP rolling chip volume acceleration was notable. You saw obviously an acceleration across the board on the gaming side. I mean, where -- what particularly is driving that? I mean I know this is the third quarter we're seeing it, but maybe now you have a better pause on what's going on and what's specifically driving that? And are there any additional programming elements or OpEx endeavors that you feel like you need to put in place to further sustain this going forward?

I think you're seeing, Dan, the property is extraordinary. The offerings are great, and we have a lot of fantastic customers in Asia. I don't think it's a different story. It's the same story. Just more and more people coming into that property, 1 experiencing and coming away very happy. And the volumes across the border, extraordinary. As I referenced, the greatest building history of casino hotels made of any operating building. Nothing way different, just more of the same, more people showing up with, got lots of money to gamble, lots of appetite. We're very fortunate. It's a very strong customer base across the region. So nothing really different now.

Yes, I just want to comment on the last part of your question. There's really nothing that we have to do from an OpEx side, except to continue to improve our service models and our programs there. We're continuing to invest in Singapore. We continue to do some renovations. While the suites are done in the casino area is mostly done, I think we're going to tie to adjust our amenity set and continue to invest in our service there. But from our standpoint, I think where we are and where we need to be, but we'll continue to look to improve as we can.

Got it. And then just pivoting to Macao as we try to unpack these numbers. On a hold-adjusted basis, EBITDA margin is down quarter-over-quarter. I mean, how much of this is just the OpEx environment, if there's any other one-offs in the quarter to highlight? I mean, given that we're a few quarters in now to the promotional strategy that you undertook. I mean, where do you feel like it's not really resonating? What strategy do you have in place that you feel like you can start to gain traction there?

Yes. Thanks, Dan, for the question. Yes, first of all, I think the marketing strategies, leveraging the Londoner Grand ramp-up since May, I think we're moving in the right direction in terms of customer growth, in terms of revenue growth across all the segments. But obviously, Macao right now is driven by the premium segments, both in rolling and non-rolling. And that's where we are getting most of our growth.

So in terms of the sequential decline in operating margin, firstly, we have higher reinvestment. But on a sequential basis, that's mostly driven by the segment mix change. So we have more rolling business as a proportion of our total gaming. And within non-rolling is dominated by the super high end on the premium mass. So that's the first factor.

Secondly, OpEx was higher, yes. We invested more on event costs and we had higher payroll as we looked primarily as a result of us increasing our operating table hour capacity. And lastly, against prior quarter but also against prior year, the non-rolling home percentage was lower by about 140 basis points. So that obviously impacts ourselves as well.

The next question will be from Lizzie Dove from Goldman Sachs.

And I'll echo my congrats to Rob. You'll definitely be missed. Sticking with Macao, I mean, you've talked in the past about the path long term to getting back to that, somewhere in that $2.7 billion, $2.8 billion kind of range for EBITDA. Curious, kind of tracking on an annualized basis, a little below that right now. How do you think about the pacing to get back there and kind of time line and what needs to happen?

So I think, first off, I think we've made a lot of changes over the last couple of quarters, both on our approach to the customer, how we think about service levels we've invested in personnel. We've had additional table hours, which you heard Grant just mentioned. I think we're really focused on both growing revenue and EBITDA. And so I think we've made some great progress this quarter.

If you look at some of our top line numbers, we've definitely grown, and we've had success in both rolling and non-rolling at [ thoughts ] as well when you look at year-over-year comps. I think for us, we're sort of working through some of the changes that we've made. And I think the trajectory is heading in the right direction. And I think we've made a lot of important changes. And I think we're in a position to do better over time. And while this quarter may not have produced the results that we want on an EBITDA basis, we see growth, we see better market positioning. We see revenue share growth, but we're heading in the right direction.

Got it. Makes sense. And then you've had so much success in Singapore with side bets and kind of just making gambling more diversified over there. I know you've talked about kind of introducing more of that in Macao. Can you maybe share an update of how far you are in terms of rolling that out in Macao, anything that's kind of different structurally or with the customer base that maybe makes it more or less appealing? And how we should kind of think about structural hold there long term?

Thank you for the question. I think in Macao, we have been continuously rolling out additional wager options on the baccarat layouts. And we've been having progressively more success in attracting volume against those side wagers. The level of participation in the side wagers is not as high as Singapore, but it is on an increasing trend. And we'll continue to innovate in terms of offering more fun and interesting side wager options in the traditional game of baccarat and also other games as well in terms of additional wager options. So that will continue. But we are seeing a rising interest in these side wagers, but it's just not as high a level as what you see in Marina Bay Sands.

The next question will be from Trey Bowers from Wells Fargo.

Great to catch up. Could you guys just talk to what you're seeing in the promotional environment in Macao? Has that changed dramatically in the near term? And what's the expectation as we make our way through '26?

So I think the market definitely has become more promotional over time. You heard Grant mention that it's much more premium-focused, and that goes hand-in-hand with that segment. That being said, we're being very competitive. And I think we're seeing the results related to our positioning as we look to be more promotional and as we add the right service levels to ensure that we can take care of these customers in a way that allows them to keep coming back. Grant, I don't know if there's anything you want to add?

Yes. I think the promotional environment remains intense. And especially in the premium segments, which is really driving the growth in the market. That said, I think we are at a more stable level now in the current quarter, and we can see that progressively in the fourth quarter. But of course, things can change anytime as competitive dynamics change. But at this point in time, I think we are stabilizing at the current levels, at least for our portfolio. And actually, we're hoping to find some headroom to optimize on the reinvestment front into 2026.

Great. Then just back to MBS, given the exit rate of where you were in Q4, if we apply seasonal levels of kind of sequential growth to the market, we come up with some pretty big numbers on the top and bottom line in the market. Is there anything to call out that you would just put out there as a put or a take against that as we kind of build our models for the next 12 months?

I don't think it's seasonal. I think this is just a building that defines the seasonality of most markets. I think it's more about the right customers showing up, events, et cetera. I don't think that people are dealing with that driven by the seasonality of the market. I think it's just a very, very -- it's the best product in the market, obviously, in one of the best parts of the world. People want to be there if you get the right people to show up. I think it's December, July, it doesn't matter as much as used to in places like Macao or Las Vegas. It's less seasonally driven, I think, and more driven by the building itself in a strong market. So I don't think seasonality figures in. I wouldn't model it based on that.

And the next question is coming from Robin Farley from UBS.

Rob, I just want to add my congratulations and best wishes. I don't even want to say how long I've know anybody, you'll be missed.

[indiscernible].

That will be between us. So I guess 1 question is, any early signs of kind of Chinese New Year levels for demand in Macao, anything you're seeing at this point?

I do want to point out that we're going to stay consistent. We're not really going to talk about current quarter. But I will tell you that if you look at the growth in the Macao market overall, it's been very encouraging. So if you look at liquidity in the market, you look at the type of players that are coming in, the value of those patrons, it is premium focused, but it's very encouraging. And I think it's good for the market overall and good for the trajectory of our business and the market.

Okay. Great. And then maybe just a follow-up on Singapore. And Rob, I hear your comments about defining seasonality and kind of -- it seems like every quarter has done better than one would have expected. But maybe so that expectation don't get to -- I mean, is there anything you would say that is like a gating issue or sort of a natural point at which maybe it wouldn't even be reasonable to think that the building could do more early? Where do you see [indiscernible]?

We've proved to be very bad in forecasting this. I think last year, I said $2.5 billion is our goal, and people kind of thought that was very ambitious. It proved to be very unambitious. So I think I have a real hard time engaging it because what you now have is this plethora of facts on favor. You have a really great place to visit in Singapore, a wonderful government supporting us. We have a building that a different level was we opened it many years ago, service levels, et cetera, and suite product.

It's just the best thing in that region, I think, and people just keep coming to it, and we are pleasantly surprised at the amount of customers, the diversity of the geographic locations they come from. It's got diversity, it's got new customers shift all the time. And any time we think, well, we lost these 4 customers for a reason, 12 more show up. And I think that's the strength of Macao -- Singapore. And I don't think we should pretend to have any great handicapping skills. Can it go to [ 3.2, 3.3, 3.4 ]? I just don't know. I mean, we've had 3 successive quarters that keep getting better and better. It feels like it's sustainable. It feels great. But I think it'll be bullish about to forecast the future and kind of go to [ 3.1 or 3.2 ] as it goes back to [ 2.7, 2.8 ]. I don't know. But I think we've now passed the point of disbelief, realize this is a real building that has real potential to keep growing if the economy stays strong and we continue to deliver a great quality of product. I have a lot of belief in its future. I don't think it's going to fall apart at all. And how much stronger does it get? I don't want to forecast. I can't -- I just can't know. I don't know how to figure out -- more people keep showing up from all over Asia wanting to gamble at Marina Bay Sands. The answer has been thus far this year, absolutely, yes.

The next question will be from Brandt Montour from Barclays.

The first one is on Macao. The rolling chip volume number is obviously very strong. VIP isn't something that you historically focused on or at least it wasn't a huge part of your mix. But given mix did weigh on the quarter, EBITDA and margins and flow through, the question would be, do you -- has there been any shift in strategy in terms of your relative focus on the VIP part of the business? And is that something we should consider more thoughtfully going forward?

Brandt, thanks for the question. I think first of all, we have said we are committed strategically to grow in every single segment in Macao that's available to us. And secondly, the growth of the market is currently primarily driven by the premium segments, and that applies both to the rolling segment and the nonrolling.

So this quarter, yes, you can see that we've had a pretty significant, terrific increase in our rolling volumes up 60% against prior year, and we're outgrowing a fast-growing market. And I think that reflects a few strategies that we put in place. Number one, we've adjusted some of our commercial programs in that segment. Number two, we've been very successful in attracting the foreign play out of the rest of the Asian markets in the rolling segment, and that's given us a good boost in the volumes. And number three, partly reflecting the strong market in that super high-end segment. We've also been successful in that super VIP rolling segment this quarter as well. So all of these factors contributed to the very strong rolling segment growth.

And yes, it's much lower margin than the other segments, but it's still a profitable segment on an absolute gross dollars basis. And of course, our primary focus right now is to grow EBITDA. And of course, if we take advantage of where the market is growing, the rolling segment is definitely a segment that we'll be concentrating on to take advantage of the market growth.

And the second question would be on Macao and Singapore. The -- there are some concerns out there that World Cup could have some level of impact, folks staying home to watch the games and not traveling as much during that tournament. When you guys look back at your historical performance in prior World Cups, do you see anything that would suggest traffic or the higher end not coming during that term for either Macao or Singapore?

I don't believe it matters at all. You watch a telephone, they can I don't think it matters at all. I really -- that's been overblown in the past and overrated. There was a time we got over was coming in to World Cup changed the world for 30 minutes. I just don't think in size of our business is the scale, it matters all that much. You guys feel differently, but I think it's -- I wouldn't -- it's not critical.

The next question will be from George Choi from Citigroup.

And congratulations, Rob, for your criteria. Firstly, on Marina Bay Sands. At [indiscernible], it looks like MBS generated enough master yard to trigger the higher mass gaming tax rate. Can you confirm if that is right? And is that the reason why we see a slight sequential decline in EBITDA margin given the reported GGR?

George, you're very good. I have to hand it to you. We hit the higher tax rate in July. And in the fourth quarter, there was about $44 million of impact.

Okay. That's good. And encouraging. And secondly, given the CapEx schedule that you guys have for the next few years on Marina Bay Sands, are you guys interested in any other investment opportunities perhaps in Japan?

Sorry, are you asking about Marina Bay Sands or Japan?

I'm just thinking, obviously, you guys have -- just kind of spent a lot of money on Marina Bay Sands. With that in mind, would you be interested in any other opportunities around the region?

Yes. I think we're constantly looking at new development opportunities in markets where we think we can do what we do well. And so if Japan were ever to present an investment opportunity that works for us, we'd consider it. But right now, we're really focused on investing on our existing properties, building IR2. We're very excited about that opportunity. That's going to be a step functional growth, we hope. And so you can see the impact that we've had in our investment programs in Marina Bay Sands and the change we have there, and we feel like we're on our way in Macao. So we're very focused on the assets that we have. And if something comes up, we're definitely interested.

The next question will be from Shaun Kelley from Bank of America.

Rob, it's been a privilege to work with you for nearly 20 years, which is hard to believe, and congratulations just on everything you've done for the industry. You'll be missed.

Maybe just kind of pivoting or kind of 1 directly for Grant, specifically on Macao. Grant, just kind of wondering as some of the initiatives you've worked on, I think we think about some specific things going back 6 to 9 months ago, like adjusting cash comp mix and maybe some more direct cash player rebates in the market, which peers were already doing. Are all those things kind of where you want them to be right now? And have they been stable for a little while? Or are you still tweaking those things at the edges and finding what the right customer balance is for the mix that you're seeing in the market today?

Yes. Thanks, Shaun, for the question. I think we've been heading in the right direction for some time. And I think we are happy with where we are. You're right, there's been a number of initiatives that we've set out to implement since 6 months ago. I think the sales and marketing programs that were put in place, the product launch that we had in the ground and also some of the adjustments that we made in the rolling segment, those are all feeding through to a higher revenue capture and higher market share.

The reinvestment environment, as I described earlier, it's still intense. And also, it's subject to month-by-month change. But at this moment, seeing what we saw in Q4, I think we're reaching a level where yes, I think there is some stability in terms of the way we see our promotional intensity. And we actually hope to be able to optimize some of that across the different segments into 2026. So 2026, I think, is going to be a year where we sustain our revenue growth against the market and then hopefully convert more of that into EBITDA.

Great. And maybe just as my follow-up, kind of on the operating expense side of the equation. Could you just talk a little bit about both kind of when traditionally you see some of those annual escalators or market-wide increases you'd see particularly on the labor cost front. Are those primarily in 4Q? Or do they kind of come in more in 1Q? I'm not sure of the timing.

And then specifically for the 4Q, did you -- was there any direct impact or a tangible impact from the NBA activities in the market? We know that was probably a big success for Macao broadly, but just wondering if whether it's marketing or operating expenses attached to that could have had an impact on margins?

Yes. Sure, I referenced that we have higher event costs for fourth quarter, and NBA was the biggest event that we conducted both across the quarter and actually ever in the history of the company. And it was, as you say, tremendously successful. I think the brand projection, I think the stakeholder engagement, the way we're able to bring in new business partners through the NBA China Games Week. And of course, the entertainment we provided to our customers and community stakeholders, I think all of those things, we are absolutely delighted by. And of course, it has a cost impact. But we are very happy that we are continuing with this event in a multiyear partnership with the NBA, and we look forward to doing the event even better in 2026.

In terms of the OpEx question, your first point, I think, refers to just general wage inflation, if I'm right, and understand your question. Generally, that those wage adjustments occur in March for us and will occur again in 2026 in March with some wage inflation that we put in place for our frontline staff.

The next question will be from Stephen Grambling from Morgan Stanley.

Rob, thanks for all the insights and stories. Given the reinvestment that you all are just mentioning through 2026 in Macao, how does this influence any strategy around renovations or reinvestment into other properties?

So I think we're very focused on upgrading our property portfolio, particularly at the high end. We've had some very strong success in the Londoner. Londoner Grand opened earlier in the year, and we're already seeing very strong adoption and strong productivity out of the higher-end suite that we've created there. And of course, we have the Londoner Suites. We have the Londoner Court, which is 1 of our core luxury products.

And so as we look around our asset base, we think we have the opportunity to add more amenities, to add better room product and better service over time. So this is part of our ongoing investment cycle in Macao and something that you'll see us do over the coming quarters.

And then maybe a quick follow-up on capital allocation. You mentioned spiking buyback and buying the stock in Hong Kong as well as the U.S. Does this eventually shift back to dividends as we get through this reinvestment cycle? Or what -- is this more of a permanent kind of shift towards buyback relative to dividend in, I would say, both entities?

I think if you look at the SCL level, just given the market dynamics and I think preferences at the Board level for SCL, hopefully, over time, you'll see the Board there approve dividend increases. And I think that's been the goal. As cash flows continue to grow, the dividend there would increase over time. And we think that's very beneficial to shareholders, including Las Vegas Sands.

I think at the Las Vegas Sands level, you see us be very consistent in the way that we repurchased shares. We've done over the last couple of years. I think we'd like to have that continue. We do think the dividend is fundamental to return to capital story. We do look at payout ratios and consider them and look at the flexibility that our cash flows provide to us, given that we do like the idea of investing in new growth opportunities. And we think that the flexibility as well as the accretion from share repurchases is kind of a balance that we like. And so you should see us heading forward in this general direction. And we've been pretty aggressive in the way that we buy back shares previously, and we're going to be positioned to do well with our future cash flows to do the same. So we're excited about it.

The next question will be from David Katz from Jefferies.

Good afternoon, everybody. Rob, thanks for everything, all the best. I wanted to just focus on Singapore for a minute. There has been a considerable amount of CapEx put in there in a variety of different places. I wanted to just go a little deeper and figure out and understand. Are all of the capital investments that we've been talked about, I know the rooms, gaming floor restaurants, amenities, maybe lobby. Are those all completed and activated at this point? And just thinking about how the property ramps from here continues to strength.

So they're not all done. So we still have work to do in other parts of the property gaming floor, yes, rooms, yes. Some public spaces, some mall lobby and SkyParks will have work to be done. So it's not fully completed. And so our goal is to continue to improve the experiences that we offer. The vast majority are done. And so you see the results, and you see how our patrons enjoy the changes that we've made. But over time, we're going to look to improve the property and continue to invest in it to continue to have it being the best in the world. That's our goal.

Understood. And if I may, as my follow-up, specifically with respect to the lobby, should we be contemplating any disruption as we go through, say, the next couple of years whenever you get to that?

No.

The next question will be from Joe Stauff from [ SIG ].

Grant, I just wanted to follow up on some of your comments about that you've -- in Macao, you think you've reached a level of stability regarding investment and the right promo mix. Is that -- could you -- just curious as to why you think that? Is that just a function of you're seeing some of the right KPIs inflecting because of that? Is it because you don't necessarily see a competitive response relative to your higher investment? I was wondering if you could broaden out that answer a little bit more.

Yes, thanks for the question. No, we can only observe from what we see in the recent months. And I think my comment simply attests to the fact that during the fourth quarter, as we progressed, we see some stabilization in the degree of promotional incentives that we're having to escalate to. I think part of it is we caught up with the market since May, and that was a progressive process. And I think in the fourth quarter, we start seeing, I think, on a stable basis, a higher level of market share and higher level of patronage across all the segments, in particular, in the segments where the market is growing the fastest, which is in the premium segments. And then we also see that dynamic apply to the rolling segment as well. So I think the evidence from the fourth quarter is -- is -- I think, offers good comfort.

However, the market changes day to day, minute by minute, so we will have to observe how competitive dynamics evolve in 2026. And one of the key drivers of how dynamics may change is obviously the level of market revenue growth, which is always tough to forecast. So I hope that gives you more color or explanation for my previous comment.

The next question will be from Steve Wieczynski from Stifel.

Congratulations, Rob, I'll add that in real quick. So Patrick, probably for you. If we think about the drop in the Macao margins, which was, I think, about 390 basis points or somewhere in that range, wondering how we should think about margins for the rest of the year, maybe how you guys are thinking about margins for the rest of the year? I'm not looking for guidance, so to speak, but just -- if we don't have visibility into that base mass business and we continue to see this shift towards rolling play and even the high end of non-rolling, should we consider the margins we saw in the fourth quarter a pretty good run rate, at least for the foreseeable future?

Yes. I think the way we think about it is that we sort of think about this business as a low 30s margin business, low 30% margin business, just given the mix of play and who's coming to the buildings, the promotional activity necessary to support the patrons. If the base mass comes back in some way, like it existed prepandemic, that's a very high-margin business, and our margin structure can change positively if we overweight towards the IP play, which is a lower-margin business, the margin may be a little bit tighter. But we'd like to believe this is a low 30s margin business and go from there.

But I think right now, we're really focused on growing revenue, growing EBITDA and the long-term health of how we grow. And we also believe that our investment over time that we talked about earlier will allow us to attract high-value patrons and position us well for future growth. And we're focused on all those things.

Okay. And then second question probably for Grant. Grant, wondering if you think about that base mass business, which hasn't really returned or improved? One maybe get your updated thoughts in terms of what you attribute that to? Or what factors do you think are kind of continue to hold that segment of the market back?

Steve, thanks for the question. I think when you see the sequential change in the quarter, obviously, base mass did not really grow, whereas premium mass did. I think what you're seeing is that the lower-end segments, the spend per head has been on a declining trend versus pre-COVID.

As to why that is the case, we can speculate different reasons. But I think the most helpful comment we can make on that is simply to observe that, yes, I think since COVID and even in the last few quarters where GGR has accelerated, the base mass, particularly looking at revenue spend per customer in those lower value segments really has been quite stagnant. And of course, you guys might be in a better position to speculate on drivers from the economy to other factors. But we can just tell you what we're seeing on the ground in terms of premium mass versus base mass. And you can see those numbers very clearly in the size that provides.

And the next question will be from John DeCree from CBRE.

And Rob, I'll pile on the gratitude, and congratulations as well. My question, Grant, also related to that base mass customer, if I could build on maybe Steve's question. And so spend per head is down, but are you seeing comparable levels of property visitation from that customer? And is there anything you guys have tried to do to stimulate higher spend? Obviously, the premium segment is quite competitive with player reinvestment, but is there anything you can do to maybe help get that customer to open up the wallet a little bit more?

Sure. We can and we are. I think property visitation across Sands China remains very strong. I think we actually slightly exceeded 2019 in 2025, approaching 100 million visitations in the whole year, but that's where we can also see the lower spend per visitation because it hasn't fed through into the base mass revenues to the extent that you would have expected given this level of property visitation.

I think what we have been doing and what we can continue to do is to leverage the assets that we have for that base mass and mid-tier across the retail malls that we have across the entertainment calendar that we provide. And obviously, all of the attractions that we can offer as the most diverse, an extensive integrated resort in Macao. And we're doing all of those things, including, I think, really pushing hard on the event calendar as well as introduce new nongaming loyalty programs into the market, particularly for the retail mall business. And we're seeing good take-up and good success in some of those initiatives. However, when we come back to the base mass gaming, that level of base mass gaming is just not growing as fast as the premium segments.

Thank you. That concludes today's Q&A session. I would now like to hand the call over to Patrick Dumont for closing remarks.

One final item today before we complete the call. I would like to mention that Rob is going to be serving in a new role as Senior Adviser to the company for the next 2 years. On behalf of the company's Board of Directors, the senior leadership team, all of our team members, I want to use this opportunity to thank Rob for 30 years of extraordinary contributions to the company and for all of his leadership. Rob served in many important leadership roles for LVS. He's also been a strong and vocal advocate for the gaming industry as a whole. There are not many individuals who have even more of this industry than he has. Rob has hired, led and mentor numerous people over the years. Many of these people serve in leadership roles in the industry or elsewhere because Rob Goldstein took the time to invest in them and their careers.

Finally, I want to recognize and thank Rob for his steadfast commitment to the Adelson family. Rob and [ Sheldon ] had a wonderful friendship and achieved so much together. On behalf of Dr. Adelson and the family, thank you, Rob, for everything you've given this company. Your contributions to this industry and this company are too many to list, but they will always be recognized and appreciated. So in closing, I would like to thank you, and I would like our entire team to look forward to working with you in your new role. Thank you, Rob.

Thank you, Patrick. Promise better margins in Macao. Stay the course. Thank you very much. Very kind. Thank you for all your kind comments. I appreciate it, and we will improve in Macao and continue to strive for better results. Thank you.

Thank you. And this does conclude today's conference. You may disconnect your lines at this time, and have a wonderful day. Thank you for your participation.

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Sands Third Quarter 2025 Earnings Call. [Operator Instructions]

It is now my pleasure to turn the floor over to Mr. Daniel Briggs, Senior Vice President of Investor Relations at Sands. Sir, the floor is yours.

Thank you, Paul. Joining the call today are Rob Goldstein, Chairman and CEO; Patrick Dumont, our President and Chief Operating Officer; Dr. Wilfred Wong, Executive Vice Chairman of Sands China; and Grant Chum, CEO and President of Sands China and EVP of our Asia operations.

Today's conference call will contain forward-looking statements. We will be making those statements under the safe harbor provision of federal securities laws. The language on forward-looking statements included in our press release also applies to our comments made on the call today. The company's actual results may differ materially from the results reflected in those forward-looking statements.

In addition, we will discuss non-GAAP measures. Reconciliations to the most comparable GAAP financial measures are included in our press release.

We have posted an earnings presentation on our website. We will refer to that presentation during the call. [Operator Instructions] This presentation is being recorded.

I'll now turn the call over to Rob.

Thank you, Dan. Good afternoon and thanks for joining us. Marina Bay Sands delivered EBITDA of $743 million. We had forecasted MBS could do $2.5 billion annually. It turns out we were too conservative we should easily exceed that figure in 2025. MBS is currently over $2.1 billion of EBITDA this year with a quarter still to go.

Mass gaming and slot was a record $905 million, reflecting 122% growth from Q3 of 2019 and 35% higher than last year. We are in the right place at the right time with the right product. Singapore is a highly desirable destination and our product is superb. It's difficult to find supreme described in magnitude of this result, operating performance and MBS is unprecedented in the history of our industry.

Macau delivered $601 million EBITDA for the quarter, which reflects an improvement in our financial results with Typhoon negatively impacted our reported EBITDA by about $20 million. We have underperformed in the Macau market for the past few years. We believe that our buildings will be enough to compete favorably, we were wrong. We've adapted to the market and changed our approach in the second quarter of 2025 to enable us to be more competitive.

Our mass market revenue jumped to 25.4% this quarter, up from 23.6% in the first quarter of 2025. We expect additional share gains and EBITDA growth in the fourth quarter. Our assets remain the strongest in the Macau market. But Londoner is moving towards $1-plus billion of EBITDA. We have meaningful opportunities for growth improvement throughout our Macau property portfolio. Importantly, the Macau market's GGR is growing, when you couple this back with our assets and our recent marketing changes, we believe will continue to improve in the fourth quarter and beyond.

Let's hear it from Patrick.

Thanks, Rob. Macau EBITDA was $601 million. We had held as expected in our rolling program, our EBITDA would have been lower by $2 million. When adjusted for higher-than-expected hold in the rolling segment, our EBITDA margin in the Macau portfolio of properties would have been 31.5%, down 160 basis points compared to the third quarter of 2024. We are focused on delivering revenue and cash flow growth at the Londoner and across the portfolio.

Margin at the Venetian was 35%, while margin at the Londoner was 31.9%. We expect growth in EBITDA as revenues grow and as we use our scale and product advantages together with targeted incentives to better address every market segment. We see opportunity in every segment.

Now turning to Singapore. MBS' EBITDA for the quarter was $743 million at a margin of 51.7%. We had held as expected in our rolling program, our EBITDA would have been lower by $43 million. With this quarter's results, we are putting in place a new methodology for the theoretical hold percentage of rolling Baccarat play for the quarter. This new approach has been enabled by the introduction of smart tables on our Baccarat Games in Singapore. This technology has now been in place at our rolling Baccarat roundtables in Marina Bay Sands for over one year. Please see Slide 7 in the earnings materials for more detail. We have provided theoretical hold rates for rolling Baccarat plays for the last 5 quarters at Marina Bay Sands. There will naturally be fluctuations in theoretical hold rate in any specific quarter driven by player betting preferences.

The record financial results of Marina Bay Sands reflect the high -- the impact of high-quality investment and market-leading product and the growth in high-value tourism. We believe we are still in the initial stages of realizing the benefits of our investments in Marina Bay Sands.

Turning to our program to return capital to shareholders. We repurchased $500 million of LVS stock during the quarter. We also paid our recurring quarterly dividend of $0.25 per share. Our Board of Directors has approved an increase in our quarterly dividend of 20% for the 2026 calendar year or $1.20 per share per year or $0.30 per share per quarter. In addition, during the third quarter and in July, we purchased $337 million of SCL stock, increasing the company's ownership percentage of SCL to 74.76% as of today. We believe repurchases of LVS' equity through our share repurchase program will be meaningfully accretive to the company and its shareholders over the long term. We look forward to continuing to utilize the company's share repurchase program to increase returns to shareholders.

Thanks again for joining the call today. And let's take some questions.

[Operator Instructions] And the first question today is coming from Dan Politzer from JPMorgan.

So for Singapore, I want to go back to the hold rate. And obviously, you guys raised it to the 4.2% for VIP. Is there any impetus or desire or potential to raise the mass hold because that one has been going up, too. So I guess, one, is that directionally similar in terms of the benefit that you're seeing from the smart tables? And two, is that something you would ever give a whole range for?

Yes. I think right now, what you're seeing is a rollout on to the floor where we can get accurate rolling table data. So we're not there yet to give you data on the mass floor because if you remember, it's a mix of games. So it's not just Baccarat. So I think that's an important point to note. And the other thing is we don't really normalize mass hold because of the volume of play at that size and getting to the, let's call it, the theoretical. So for us, it's much more meaningful to deal with the rolling program because of the volatility of the hold in that segment.

Got it. That makes sense. And then just turning to Macau, this is more of a high level one. Londoner does seem like it's turned the corner. You guys have been marketing broadly across the portfolio there. Can you kind of talk about that path back to $2.7 billion, $2.8 billion of EBITDA that you kind of laid out is maybe a soft target last quarter, how are you pacing in terms of getting back there? Would you say that you need the market to kind of pick up from here to get there? Or can you kind of do this independent of the market to help?

I would say, Dan, you can't do independent market, you need market growth, which you're experiencing thankfully in Macau. The overall markets could be next year of $33 billion, $34 billion. We need -- everyone needs market growth to make [indiscernible] numbers work better. But we also had the main changes, and we've been making those changes in the last, I don't know, 4, 5 months and adapt to the market, which is we did not participate are now participating. Probably we're halfway there, another half to go. But I think when you marry the market growth to our assets to our new marketing programs, yes, we can get to our target. But critical to the market grows. That's essential for all of us. Otherwise, [indiscernible] the same customers are circulating.

But you're seeing -- we've come off the bottom here, we're growing, we're getting better. Probably [ 620 ] is the right number. If you take out the Typhoon. It's a respectable quarter. It's not our goal. Our goal, as you know, is to get to [ 2,728 ]. We're not there yet. I think we're making progress, and we keep putting down -- the team has to stay in sync with the market to deliver those results. Grant?

Yes. I think this quarter, what we saw was, I think, some of our reinvestment programs coming to fruition in terms of productivity across Londoner, yes, because this is the first quarter we've had the full deployment of the Londoner Grand rooms and suites. And on the product side, that definitely helped us. And then to Rob's point, in terms of our marketing strategies, responding to the market dynamics, we've obviously adjusted our reinvestment rates across the portfolio, not uniformly. Obviously, some of our smaller properties have had a bigger boost in our reinvestment ratios, as you can see. And we're seeing the results of that. You can see that both year-on-year and sequentially, we are outgrowing the market for the first time in a long time when you look at the mass GGR.

I think the weak link in our portfolio in Parisian, in sand, especially Parisians come way off the highs and about 50% of its -- used to be [indiscernible] of EBITDA performance, I think we have a lot of value in that property. Londoner, as you referenced, is fine. Venetian is okay. And I just think we've got to come off the bottom in Sands to get that back to being competitive. But it's underway. It's progressing. It just takes a lot of work and a lot of focus.

The next question is coming from Shaun Kelley from Bank of America.

To whoever wants to take it, I want to go back to Singapore because the smart table initiative is super interesting. Can we just unpack a little bit, though, about like -- what's the underlying betting behavior or change that would sort of be driving such a material increase? I mean, obviously, on your numerator, this type of change in hold would suggest some sort of underlying behavioral change or mix change. So is it mix of betters and we're maybe getting more casual better? Or is it a mix in, again, what games or in what they're making? Because I mean, historically, we think of Baccarat, in particular, as being extremely simple player banker. So how is the smart table piece evolving in a way that we're seeing an actual underlying change in behavior?

So just to be clear, the smart table is just the [ score keeper ], it's the umpire, the referee. It doesn't make this stuff happen. What makes it happen is, as you alluded to, historically, Baccarat's been [indiscernible] when I began in this industry, Baccarat was a boring game, its a [ sub-free ] whole percentage game, there was not a lot of juice in it. And it stayed that way for decades. What's changed in Baccarat is not the smart tables, that's the score keep, what's changed is the game itself offers a lot more opportunities to gamble different ways, it's analogous to sports betting and your side bets and sports bets, the [indiscernible] honestly, the low percentage bets for the customer play in your favor. And this is simply mathematics. This isn't casual betters, this isn't [indiscernible] better, this is everybody gravitating towards side bets that are house advantaged. And that's what's happening here. I don't think -- we tell you it's [ 4.1 or 4.2 ]. That's what the smart tables tell us. The score keeper said, "Hey, these guys are making these bets and that results in this result". It has the game, as you alluded to, it's changed dramatically from the old days was kind of a steady game. It's a very interesting [indiscernible] lots of opportunities that lose your money in different ways and people -- and especially in Singapore, we're seeing all levels, not just casual, but seasoned pros seem to want to bet these side bets. And it's become very powerful. And in a company like ours, which is Baccarat-dependent, it's a powerful driver of revenue and EBITDA flow through. So what you're seeing in Singapore is simply not the smart table helping us, but the game deviations helped us and the customers win to bet those deviations has driven this thing to 4-plus percent, which is astounding when you think back to what used to be a very boring [ 2.85 ] game for years. But that's a simple factor. This isn't an anomaly, it's just the way the market is proceeding. I think you'll see it happen in Macau as well. And for this company, it's a massive, massive change in the opportunity to make more money.

I think you have to give credit to our gaming innovation team for their willingness to really look at the customer experience and had the opportunity to enhance that experience through some higher volatility bets, which the customers are actually using. And it's their preference, right, they could choose not to use them, but they seem to be very popular, they create a better gaming experience and better enjoyment in the game. And so we're very fortunate that our team continues to innovate and try these things. And the market has received them quite well. And so I think the smart table system has helped us measure these bets better, but it's a practical matter, it's just as Rob said, it's about having the bets on the table and having the customers enjoy using them.

Very clear. And Rob, you kind of went where I was going to take it, which I think this is the next logical place, which is the ability to expand these types of bets or these types -- this type of table to other markets, obviously, Macau being and a big opportunity. So can you just talk a little bit about either where you're at and rolling that out? What segments, I mean, I would assume, given that sort of the junket based VIP business, is no longer a thing there, but perhaps in-house VIP or premium mass would have some real opportunities. So where are you at? What inning are you in? And then just maybe super high level, is this technology or these bets, are these proprietary to you all? I mean, I know there's kind of open secrets in gaming. But I mean you are developing these in-house, there's not like a third party that's kind of brought these to you from a sort of just pure optionality perspective?

Yes. We probably were the initiators as much a decade ago, we started this process with someone. We grew that team. The team has now expanded. So [ we were the issue ]. We're not -- it's not proprietary. We can't -- we don't have control and people can copy these bets. They are copying these beds, which, by the way, doesn't assume to be a problem. It's good for the industry to grow. Yes, we're moving towards this in Macao. Yes, the Smart table system will be there as well as a score keeper. And so as the Macau market has more opportunity, you're seeing it happening already. I think you'll see the [indiscernible] go up there as well. It's the more advantageous thus far in Singapore, but we are moving into Macau as is the Macau market. You go look at the layouts now, they're fraught with side bets [ oil ] plays. In fact, some of the times, you can't find the [ flat bed ], you're so busy with alternatives.

But yes, moving in that direction to Macau. No, it's not proprietary. Yes, we did develop it. I think we've initiated it. But -- and again, the confusion is sometimes people think it's a smart table, which is not true at all. The smart tables gives you a better measurement stick to know how many bets they're making in the side what that means the mathematics. And I think what Patrick alluding to the [ 4.1 or 4.2 ] is we have good evidence that these are -- this is not a guessing more or it should be this. For years [indiscernible] correct whole percentage. There is no correct whole percentage. It depends on that quarter, what those people bet. We can have a quarter that comes in at [ 5.1 or come at 3.8 ]. It depends on what the players at the table bet at that time, and every bet is calculated. So yes, it's going to move towards Macau. And I think it's very helpful for not just this company but others to make the gaming more interesting more diversified. And I don't think it's tied to the high end, by the way. Mass customers love it, too, small betters, large betters [indiscernible] sports book, the biggest prop better is the small guys. The guys who are betting 100 hours a game, they love betting props. I think Baccarat is similar to sports betting in that regard.

The next question is coming from Stephen Grambling from Morgan Stanley.

So you've upped the dividend for next year and you keep the pedal down on buyback. At the same time, you had the disclosure around CapEx is coming down as well over the next few years. So one thing you didn't touch on, I guess, that you talked about in the past is just maybe a willingness to buy back some of the shares in Hong Kong as well. So I wonder if you any thoughts that you have there or other capital allocation opportunities.

So I think the best thing is we are a capital allocation story and a return to capital story. You look at the company's history, we've been very shareholder-friendly. We allocate capital with growth in mind. So we invest for high returns. [indiscernible] those high-return investment opportunities are available. We return the capital and we try to do it through dividends in a prudent manner and through share repurchases. And so I think that's where you're seeing us today. We did buy back SCL for the last little while. If you kind of see where we're at, we're basically getting close to the limit we're at 74.76% I think the number is. And we can't really go past 75%. So I think for us right now, we're kind of where we are in SCL. But our goal is to continue to return capital both at SCL and in the [ parent code ], a friendly way. for shareholders. And so you'll see us continue to do that.

Makes sense. And maybe changing gears a little bit. Just going back to Macau. Would love any further color you could provide on kind of characterizing the strength that we've seen in DIP. I mean, it's been quite a while since we've seen this level of growth. Is that really just more semantics around where customers are referring to bet? Or is that a new customer who's coming in?

Stephen, let me take that. Yes, I think the VIP has outgrown the mass GGR over the last few months. In some cases, some months it's been -- it's been very high rates of growth. I think it is driven by some concentration of super high-end VIP players as well as increased liquidity in the market. This quarter, we haven't participated as much in that segment, but we are going to be getting more competitive in that segment as well. And of course, we have introduced our -- we entered the junket market this quarter. Of course, the growth of that segment in the past few months has also driven the rolling market. But at this point, it still remains a low margin segment, which typically is going to stay around 12% to 15% of the overall GGR. But we're also focused on growing that segment. But obviously, the bulk of the profit growth is going to come from the non-rolling.

The next question will be from Brandt Montour from Barclays.

I just want to double click on that comment. I mean I think that we all kind of see the premium mass led inflection since midyear. But it sounds like -- I mean looking at your slides, base mass per table was up nicely. And so I guess, Rob, for you, the question is that for the market to grow, what you need the market to grow [ 3334 ] when you think about that growth, is that -- does that require a broadening out of the depth and breadth of base mass? And are you seeing early signs of that inflection for that particular cohort?

I think it's impossible to say where it comes from, I'll be honest. I don't -- the junket they're rolling, they're not rolling the math, it's very hard to define. I think what's important to see is happening. I mean, the market looks to me like it's -- we know that October comes in, I would say it comes in 7%, 8%, 9% year-on-year. But it feels like there's a stronger trend over there. Macau is recovering in different segments. Obviously, we like a base mass recovery, but there's nothing like premium mass. I don't have real insight to where it come from, right? So it comes. Because I think the key thing for all Macau, for all the operators for profitability and growth is to see this GGR acceleration.

Grant, maybe you see it different?

I think that's right. And it is obviously helpful, especially to us if the base mass grows faster because of our advantage in that segment, but also the margin structure in that segment is very favorable. I think if you look at this quarter, you're right. Year-on-year, our base mass actually grew 18%. But part of that reflects the fact that a prior year, we had the closure of the Pacific Casino which is now the Londoner Grand Casino. If you look at sequentially, premium mass, we still grew faster than base mass 11% versus 7%. But yes, I think the summer was positive for base mass but again, I would characterize the bulk of the growth in this market, even in a non-rolling is still dominated by the upper tiers of the value segment.

Okay. Just a quick question on Singapore. Obviously, really strong results in the third quarter in MBS, and that was without the race, which usually falls in September it fell -- is now in October this year. So you didn't have that in the third quarter. What order of magnitude or how should we think about how impactful that event is that sort of has now moved into the fourth quarter for you now this year?

First off, it's a great event, and it's a great event globally, and it's one of the most important F1 events, and it's phenomenally attended and it really helps Singapore. And we're actually really supportive of it and involved in its presentations. So we're very happy about that. As a practical matter, you can see the demand of Marina Bay Sands as a product and that even with F1 in a different part of the calendar year, we continue to perform through that. So I think F1 is helpful, something that we really enjoy having in Singapore. It's great for visitation, it increases the prestige of Singapore by having such a prominent race there. It drives a lot of high-value visitation, much of which ends up at Marina Bay Sands. So we're very happy about it. But where it falls in the calendar is okay or fine.

I got to say that for the last couple of years, we had all these people pointing to F1 or Taylor Swift or I don't know, I don't think it matters all that much. I think Singapore has taken a whole new -- we can't figure out just how high is up. This thing just keeps getting stronger and stronger. And the reason to me is very simple. It's the most favorable location, a lot of people with high net worth to come to whether F1 is there or Taylor Swift is there or whoever is there that weak, I think the place -- the building is extraordinary, the place is extraordinary, and the events certainly move the customers around. In the end, Singapore is the driver. That place is well attended, well visited, very desirable. And it's become the place to go to in Asia for people who want to gamble at a certain level. And I think that's really the real driver is unique asset we built, unique room product. And again, what we provide there the option to gamble what you want, how you want.

So as much as I respect F1, I respect Taylor Swift, I respect all these drivers, I think Singapore has just gone to a whole new place, and you see these numbers. I thought we were ambitious in [ 2.5 ]. We probably this year, we get, I don't know, [ 2.7, 2.8, 2.9 ], I don't know , but the numbers are there. And it just seems like it's getting more and more desirable the high end of the market. So extraordinary results. I think no one could have seen this kind of growth. And I don't think it's that tied to special, not as much as tied to the place itself.

The next question is coming from Robin Farley from UBS.

Great. Just going back to your comments about kind of what you hope to achieve in market share in premium mass. I know you talked about upgrading the Londoner would kind of give you the assets to do that. You said something earlier in the call about how you're kind of only halfway there with what you hope to do or plan to do there. Can you talk a little bit about what other steps that you'll be taking and sort of what timing when you think about that?

Robin, let me take that. Yes. I think when you look at the progression in market share, clearly, would come off the bottom in Q1 when we were down at 23.5%, 23.6%. Now we are 2 points above that, which is great. But as Rob said, I think we're only halfway through, is that we started our tweaking our programs and changing our marketing programs in the middle of second quarter and that ramped up throughout each month in the third quarter. And you can see we were improving month-on-month within the quarter.

But I think it's important that we're also considering how each segment has a different requirement. So we are marrying the tactical incentives with the product advantage that we have. So in the Londoner that you can see it very clearly what we're doing, not just Londoner Grand, which is newly open, but also leveraging the other side of Londoner on the super high end and we're seeing good results there. I think in the smaller properties, we have adjusted our marketing programs, but also reset our distribution team as well in terms of composition and the number of people. So we should be seeing better results from the distribution side over the next two to three quarters because so far, what we've benefited most from, I think, the launch of Londoner Grand, married with these customer reinvestment adjustments. But I think there's still a lot to be done, but we're confident that we're going to be progressing month by month, quarter-by-quarter.

Great. And maybe just one follow-up on a different topic. I don't know if we've heard your thoughts to recently on any potential opportunity in the UAE where there may be other licenses to give out. Is that something that LVS is interested and kind of actively engage with?

I really appreciate the question. So we're always looking at opportunities to deploy capital and grow our business. And I think you've seen us be very disciplined and be very patient. The UAE is a tremendous tourism market. There's been really it's [indiscernible] investment in the UAE to create tremendous [indiscernible] of infrastructure, some of the best hospitality and food and beverage products in the world are located there. And it's a lot of fun to visit. That being said, it's not a market we're looking at this time, but we're [indiscernible].

The next question is coming from Lizzie Dove from Goldman Sachs.

So clearly, incredible results in Singapore again. And you mentioned for this year, '27, '28, '29, who knows. It feels like it's [indiscernible] that you said not tied to one event, but how should we think about the long term? Like is this sustainable? Can it, on a holder, just a basis grow next year? Like how are you thinking about kind of longer tail [indiscernible] the sustainability of growth in Singapore?

Lizzie I'd say we've been wrong all along for starters, and we've under forecasted this thing, we thought we were very ambitious at [ 2.5 ]. And like I said, we're a [ 21-plus ] currently with a quarter ago. With a big quarter, you get to [ 2.8, 2.9 ] is it sustainable? Yes, it's very sustainable. You're alone over there and you've got one competitor, which is just -- it's a duopoly, it's a market that has tremendous support of the government. And it's -- you've been in the building, it's incredibly well done. I think the team did a great job of building out a one-of-a-kind assets. So yes, it's very sustainable.

The question I can answer is -- does it get to [ 3 ] next year, is it a [ 3, 2 ] down the road? Does is get to -- I don't know. We've been rolling along. Here we are in 2025, as you said two years ago, we're delivering $700 million quarters back to back I would have said that's very ambitious. Well it turns out it was done easily. These last quarters came along pretty well. And so I don't think anyone should question the longevity and sustainability of Singapore. If anything, what I can't figure out is how deep is the well, and I've been wrong and I'm pretty aggressive by nature in forecasting the demand over there. [indiscernible] is going to break $1 billion looks like. These table wins are extraordinary, it's coming out to all sides. I think strength in the building, having all suites versus mostly more rooms is a very good idea. So yes, I think it's very sustainable. And the question for me is not sustainability, it's how high is up? Could this thing hit $3 billion, get to [ 3, 2 ]?, I don't know. But I didn't think you go from what used to be a $1.6 billion asset pre-COVID to now it looks like a $2.78 billion asset post-COVID. So -- it's hard to forecast something that feels so powerful and right now, it feels to me like it's got more growth to go.

Definitely. I guess on that subject, just one event, but making a bigger picture, I guess, on Golden week, it looked like -- there was a lot of outbound visitation from China into Singapore. It was up a lot year-on-year. And so curious what you're seeing really even just beyond Golden Week of just any changes in visitation trends and whether you are versus Macau seeing that kind of high-end -- higher-end Chinese customer visiting Singapore at the expense of Macau and whether you think that might continue?

Yes, we're not really getting into the current quarter. But just overall, Macau and Singapore are very separate markets. And typically, the catchment area for Singapore is very focused on Southeast Asia, and Macau is primarily [indiscernible] in China. So different businesses, different tourism base, different assets, but we'll talk about this quarter on the next earnings call.

The next question is coming from Joe Stauff from Susquehanna.

Just wanted to follow-up, Patrick, on your comment about, a, the opportunity in Singapore in particular, is still essentially in the early innings, obviously, maybe an expansion of other questions. I wondered if you could just maybe talk about the second and third quarter, the strength of the volumes and maybe the things that you learned that surprised you? And then as we think about the opportunity set going forward, I understand it's hard to put a number to it. But maybe some of the bigger layers of opportunity, is it a strategy such that you'd expect to get a higher level of average spend? Is it geographical reach? Are there any puzzle pieces you can give us from that perspective?

There's a lot there in this question. So bear with me, I'm going to try to get through it all. I think the first thing is the way we got to Singapore today and this performance was very deliberate. And it started probably 5 years ago, we first started charting out where we wanted to go with the asset, given where we thought the direction of growth in high-value tourism would be. And we start off by building a great customer experience by focusing on the physical asset, which took time to both design and ultimately implement. We redesigned our service teams that we could better service our customers in a more complete way. And that was also a big lift. We focused a lot on how we sold, how we attracted customers by developing larger and more geographically spread out marketing teams and sales teams. And all that come together with a very strong management group over time with lots of investment produced this result. So this was not something that happened overnight. It was planned. It was a strategic decision. It was an investment over many years in both human capital and physical capital, along with the philosophy with a service focus and a customer experience focus. We focused on a lot of different amenities, how we enhance our entertainment, how we enhance our retail mall, how we enhance our food and beverage and how we bring it all together so that gaming customers can come in and get a lifestyle experience that can't be replicated in any place else. And so for us, that was really key.

So the question is how do we grow the business more? Well, first off, I think people are just getting to know that we're in Marina Bay Sands. Remember, the renovation has not been done for that long. So we have a lot of customers who maybe experienced Marina Bay Sands a decade ago, and are not surprised by what's on offer today.

I think the other thing is the quality of tourists that is coming to Singapore is continuing to elevate. There are also a lot of people who are engaging in commerce out of Singapore, and that's growing. So we have a lot of people on the leisure and on the business tourism side that are experiencing Marina Bay Sands and it's only growing. I think segments that we look to in the future continue to bring high-value tourism from different parts of the [indiscernible] area and we're working on that. And to be fair, at some point, we're going to run out of capacity, and that's where IR2 comes in. Someone asked us earlier about how we feel about the sustainability of Singapore as a market for us. And I think the biggest statement is that we're investing $8 billion to continue to grow our presence there. And that to me is the biggest signal that we're very serious about long-term investment for the success of Singapore. But I think for us, it's going to come from continuing to attract high-value tests, continue to bring in high-value business and leisure tourism activities, great entertainment, great retail, continuing to lead and amenities the investments that are necessary to stay at the forefront of tourism and attract high-value tourists from different markets, and we'll continue to grow. That was the strategy, and we're executing it now.

Maybe just a quick clarification. Earlier in my response to a question on smart table deployment for the mass tables and games area of Singapore, are you 6 months? Are you 9 months behind kind of the process that you went through with the rolling tables?

It's not that we're behind. It's that -- we have it on some games and not on others. Remember, our casino floor as Baccarat, has [indiscernible], has a bunch of other different gaming products that are there, actually including crafts, like we've got different types of games out on the floor. And so not all those games are ready for this digital table system. So over time, we'll get there. But remember, we make most of our money from Baccarat. And the area with the most volatility was the rolling programs. And so we started there.

The next question is coming from Chad Beynon from Macquarie.

Just wanted to revisit the comments around reinvestment program. You guys have been very open and honest in terms of your strategy and your competitive strategy in the market, I guess, year-to-date in your decision to change that. Have you seen any change with those competitors that maybe are now on a level playing field from a reinvestment strategy and maybe they don't have the product or the service that you guys have and they could potentially step outside of the current ZIP code of what's being provided to players? Or does it remain pretty rational?

Yes, let me take that. I think in general, the competition remains intense, and we don't foresee that to slow down. I think what you see is basically constant action and reaction we have to stay very alert to those changes, which we are and like what Rob said, we're going to be laser focused on basically responding to the market with the right office. And I think you can see the benefit of that change in our marketing strategy over this quarter, and that will continue.

As to what other people are going to do and how they will respond, I think that's just an evolving picture that we have to monitor. And you would expect that the market to continue to be very competitive. But the positive aspect of the market is that we are seeing GGR growth, and I think that helps all of us, but it will stay competitive and we're very committed to staying ultracompetitive.

And then Patrick, I know the digital gaming business, I guess, the doors have been open or slightly open for the past couple of years. You haven't made many moves, but now you're officially closing that door, those windows. So why now? And then any cost saves that we should think about for our models?

Yes. I think we looked at this for a couple of years. I think we just didn't feel like there was something that we felt would be a good use of shareholder capital. So we shut it down. In terms of cost save, I think it's just things that all come out of development expense that you would have seen in the last year, but that's out now. It wasn't super material.

The next question will be from George Choi from Citigroup..

So obviously the encouraging [ whole rate ] disclosure in Singapore, very, very solid. But I'm just wondering when will you do the same thing in Macau? Is there any significant difference in terms of the player behavior on how much they wager on the side bets that make you -- make it different between how you do it in Singapore versus Macau?

One thing to note that our rolling volumes are much larger relative to our overall gaming win in Singapore. And so there was a real focus there to begin with that. Also, the number of tables are smaller in Singapore than they are in Macau. So I just want to highlight that, but I'll turn it over to Grant to respond to the rest of the question.

Yes, George, just to reiterate the distinction Rob made, that the smart technology helps us to understand what is happening at the table. Independent of that is the player propensity it's not one leading the other. So I think on the question of propensity to wager in the side wages in Macau, it is -- the mix is obviously smaller than in Singapore, but it's also rising and it has contributed to enhanced house edge over the past several years. And as you of all of the people here, you're visiting all these casinos. And you can see the layouts are being reinvented every few months with additional side wages. So that's on the side wages.

In terms of the smart tables, We, in Macau, have actually fully rolled out on [indiscernible] Baccarat tables, all of the smart table technology and we are in the process of completing the rollout in the rolling segment. So within the next few months, we should be able to gauge across the total [ Baccarat table ].

As a follow-up, now that we have a myriad of side bets in the Baccarat tables in both Singapore and Macau, I was just wondering how do you strike a balance between improving the incremental excitement and experience for players from obviously, these new side bets versus any potential cannibalization amongst the various side bets?

Well, I think the great thing about it is all the original bets are there. So if you -- all the bets that people are used to, are still in the [ belt ]. So this is really just up to the player, it's just an option. It just gives them some additional volatility if they want to take it. So for us, it's really a player decision. And in some cases, they take it. In some cases, they don't, which is the reason why [ Robert's ] remarks that in Singapore, you may see a quarter where we hold [ 5 ] where you see -- where we will [ high 3s ]. It just depends on propensity, the preference of the player to want to make that water. But as a practical matter, the games has more options, but it doesn't foreclose the ability for them to bet a more traditional path.

[ If you own a flatbed ], you can flatbed all day long. Bank player, high payer. It's not -- it doesn't exclude those bets. It's just like it's no different for years than the Super Bowl. The year people thought there was something different about the Super Bowl, all the while is they offered 2,000 side beds versus the usual [indiscernible]. All we've done here is expand the side bets. And -- but the unusual bets are still there, traditional bets people want to bet. So it's their decision whether to make that decision on what to bet. It's not ours, we don't dictate it.

I think the important thing here to remember is that we are iterative in the way that we apply new bets on the belt. So what you see today is after attempts to improve the game experience for people. We're very focused on the experience. So if players like it, that's great and we keep it out there and they use it. And if it makes their trip more enjoyable, that's fantastic. If it's not something that's preferred by the players, eventually it evolves itself out of the game. And we've had a lot of different iterations of what's on the belt. So I would just view this as an enhancement to the gaming experience mechanism. And so they enjoy the volatility, they enjoy the additional bets. And so they use them. But as to how those best will progress over time. Player's preferences may change over time. You may see us have different side bets on the belt over time as players change what they want to do.

That's a very important point. [In a supermarket ] we keep putting these on the shelves that sell and don't sell. We're constantly coming up with new bets all the time. We have a very important committee called the Make More Money Committee. That job is to find all bets and deviation [indiscernible] thing. And if things don't sell, we take it off the table and put something else to try it out. It's evolving all the time. It's kind of a static function.

The next question will be from David Katz from Jefferies.

With respect to Macau, one of the topics of conversation and one of the things that we're tracking very carefully is events, whether they're concerts or otherwise. Can you talk to us about your strategy around those? And more specifically, the recent I know it's sort of -- maybe post the end of the quarter, but I'd love to hear any general comments, learnings, opportunities, et cetera, around the NBA games that were hosted and events in general.

So I think, first off, going back to early days of the Venetian with Rob, entertainment has always been front and center. And I think it's something that's always helped us in the gaming business and the perception of the excitement around our properties. We've always been focused on providing high quality entertainment and actually building the assets to support it. Many years ago, our SCL built a first Arena in Macau for this very reason. And we've been very dedicated to programming it and creating entertainment that's been very successful over the years in creating opportunities for our patients to have a great experience. And I think you'll see that as well in Singapore. We broke ground in mid-July on what we're calling IR2 right now, eventually, we'll have a name. And we're building a 15,000-seat live performance venue there. That will be the most technologically advanced arena in Asia and provide a great customer experience to live performance. And we're always very focused on it. And so for us, I think it's a very important benefit for a company to have that excitement that goes along with entertainment, but also gives our patients something to experience in the environment as part of the lifestyle that we provide to them.

In terms of the NBA, this was something we started working on many years ago. We're very fortunate the NBA is a great partner. They really pulled out all the stops. They were very supportive. I have to give credit to both the Brooklyn Nets and the Phoenix [indiscernible] for the support that they gave to the China games. They really showed up in force. And there are teams that did a lot of charity events in the local community. They were great with the fans, really it's an unbelievable experience. And our team was very excited because the reaction in Macau was very strong. I think just some of the goals we set out for this event was to create something that brought a unique form of entertainment to highlight Macau and to showcase the investment that we've made and how high quality Macau is as a global tourism destination. And I think that goal was achieved. I think the media coverage, the social media into China, the social media externally around the globe has been very positive. I think the teams play very competitively. And I think it was a great format for the leak so I think that benefits Sands China because of that collaboration. I think it created a lot of excitement for our patients when they actually came to the games, and there was this outstanding visitation. And there was just a heightened sense of visitation around the business.

In terms of the impact, again, we'll talk about it at the end of this quarter, we'll have better data. But I think overall, it was a very strong success. We're very happy with the results. I think our fans and the NBA, we're very happy I think we did a lot of things that helped the local community, which is also a benefit.

And then lastly, we think it was very beneficial for Sands China on a lot of different levels. I think the marketing value that's created for us was also very strong. So a lot of benefit to it. And I also think we accomplished some of the goals that we set out in our concessional renewal, which was to bring, let's call it, high-value sports, global sports to Macau, which I think we did very successfully. So a lot of positive things all around.

I don't know, Grant, do you have any other comments or anything you'd like to add?

No, I think covers it very well. I think it did showcase Macau in a very, very favorable light. It was great for the city to have such a, I would say, strong visitation from different countries. As you know, the government has been very keen on pushing us to have international events drawing visitors from different countries around the region, but in the rest of the world. And I think this event really highlighted the attraction of Macau as an international tourism destination like Patrick said, and I think we're proud of delivering this first set of China games from Macau. And I think we got a lot of cost positive price, not just from the people who came from different corners of the world, but also a very positive feedback from the local community.

The next question will be from John DeCree from CBRE.

Thanks for all the color and commentary so far. I wanted to ask a follow-up on kind of more of the strategic priorities outlined in your deck development. I know you gave some comments about the UAE specifically. But curious what you're seeing around the globe, if there's anything particularly interesting right now. And I guess I specifically asked about Japan. You guys obviously looked at that in the past. This new Prime Minister, I think, historically supportive of IR. So curious if it's worth another look at Japan and anything else that might be out there right now that's garnering your attention.

Look, I think our strategic priority is to deploy capital in high-growth projects. And we're always looking at those opportunities and always evaluating them to see if the returns are there with the appropriate factor of safety. And I think for us, as I said before, we're looking at the UAE, trying to observe it and follow it. Obviously, Japan was something we're very interested in the past, although that seems unlikely. There's been talk about Thailand, which is something that we've expressed interest in the past. So we're very patient and we're constantly looking, and we'll see what opportunities arise. But as of right now, there's nothing really to report.

And the next question will be from Steve Wieczynski from Stifel.

So Patrick, I apologize if I missed this in your prepared remarks. But if we think about the 150 basis point decrease in your Macau margins, Wondering if most of that was tied pretty much directly to your change in marketing strategy or if that was just something else?

Yes, I think it was a combination of marketing strategy and a little bit of higher cost. But I think the key thing for us is the way we get operating leverage and increase margin over time despite growing revenue. You said it all along, I think there was a question earlier that Rob answered about the size of the Macau market. If you look at the Macau market today, it's growing, it's growing both in the mass segment and the VIP segment, which is very beneficial. I think we're very positive on the Macau market overall. And the way we're going to grow EBITDA and grow margins is through revenue growth. We have a great team there, but we have a big cost basis. So we need to leverage it. We need to get more volume.

Okay. Got you. And then, Rob, second question, if we go back to Singapore real quick, I mean you're at the point where you're pushing almost $1,000 a night per room. And yes, look, I understand there's more room capacity -- I understand there's more room capacity coming online in the next couple of years. But this is probably a little bit of a higher level question, but wondering, Rob, how you're thinking about room rates not only maybe now and your ability to still take price there, but maybe how you're thinking about room rates once your additional capacity comes online?

I think it's kind of irrelevant if you ask me. Our goal is to not sell rooms, just give away people who gamble because to be honest, that's the business we're in. You can't spend the kind [indiscernible] spend in Singapore in charge. If you charge $1,000 or $2,000 or -- last time I checked, you're not building $8 billion hotels anywhere. This is a gaming casino with a hotel attached to it. So our goal in Singapore, every night, we can, is to give these [indiscernible] people high-value gaming customers to drive $3 billion, $4 billion, $5 billion of top line revenue. That's the business we're in over there. I don't think -- we can squeeze the rates higher. I think we want to and the cash but it's such a small offering, we're mostly a [indiscernible] today. But the real goal is to not sell any rooms in IR 1 or 2, given where high-value gaming customers drive that site. You don't make $3 billion annualized with hotels. It's just that simple. So it's a very interesting dynamic, we [indiscernible] the hotel, it's working very well, we attract the high-value casino customers. That is the focus, not the ADR to be blunt with you. I think [indiscernible] selling for $2,000 rates of failure. We're not in the rooms business. We're in the casino hotel business, and those who simply are there to attract those patients to drive these ridiculously high EBITDAs.

Come visit, we'll give you a free room.

No free room.

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, this does conclude today's conference call. You may disconnect your phone lines at this time, and have a wonderful day. We thank you for your participation.

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Sands Second Quarter 2025 Earnings Call. [Operator Instructions]

It is now my pleasure to turn the floor over to Mr. Daniel Briggs, Senior Vice President of Investor Relations at Sands. Sir, the floor is yours.

Thank you. Joining the call today are Rob Goldstein, our Chairman and CEO; Patrick Dumont, our President and Chief Operating Officer, Dr. Wilfred Wong, Executive Vice Chairman of Sands China; and Grant Chum, CEO and President of Sands China and EVP of our Asia operation.

Today's conference call will contain forward-looking statements. We will be making those statements under the safe harbor provision of federal securities laws. The language on forward-looking statements included in our press release and 8-K filing also apply to our comments made on the call today. The company's actual results may differ materially from the results reflected in those forward-looking statements.

In addition, we will discuss non-GAAP measures. Reconciliations to the most comparable GAAP financial measures are included in our press release.

We have posted an earnings presentation on our website, we will refer to that presentation during the call.

[Operator Instructions] This presentation is being recorded.

I'll now turn the call over to Rob.

Thanks, Dan, and good afternoon, and thank you for joining us. Marina Bay Sands had a historic quarter third quarter EBITDA of $768 million. We had forecasted that MBS could do $2.5 billion annually, and that may just happen this year. All the pieces are in place for this property to continue to perform. Mass gaming and slot win did $843 million, reflecting a 97% growth in Q2 of 2019, 40% higher than last year same quarter.

We are in the right place at the right time. Singapore is a very desirable destination. Our product is as good as it gets. It's difficult to find superlatives that describe the magnitude of this result is unprecedented for a single building to perform like this.

Macau did $566 million of EBITDA for the quarter. We have underperformed in this market. We will not [ address ] enough as it relates to customer reinvestment. We believe our billings would be enough, we were wrong. And so in the middle of the quarter, we changed our approach to enable us to increase market share and EBITDA. We will, however, be market sensitive.

Our assets remain the strongest in the world. The Londoner is open and moving towards our goal of $1 billion of annualized EBITDA. This new approach will create higher market share EBITDA.

At the same time, Macau's GGR accelerated this quarter, a very positive sign. Our goal is to review Macau. And that [indiscernible] Macau's increased GGR and our strong assets will enable us to deliver improved results in the future. Let's turn to Patrick for more [indiscernible].

Thanks, Rob. Macau EBITDA was $566 million. If we had held as expected in our rolling program, our EBITDA would have been lower by $7 million. When adjusted for higher-than-expected [ holds ] on rolling segment, our EBITDA margin for the Macau portfolio properties would have been 31.3%, down 80 basis points compared to the second quarter of 2024. All 2,450 rooms and suites at the Londoner Grand were available over the last two months of the quarter. We are focused on delivering revenue and cash flow growth at the Londoner across the portfolio.

Margin at the Venetian was 35.6%, while margin at The Plaza and Four Seasons was 34% and margin at the Londoner was 31.9%. We expect growth in EBITDA as revenues grow as we use our scale and product advantages together with targeted reinvestment to better address every market segment.

Now turning to Singapore. MBS' EBITDA for the quarter was $768 million at a margin of 55.3%. If we had held as expected in our rolling program, our EBITDA would have been lower by $107 million. There will naturally be fluctuations and hold rate in any specific quarter driven by game mix and player preference.

The record financial results of Marina Bay Sands reflect the impact of high-quality investment in market-leading products and the growth in high-value tourism. We believe we are still in the initial stages of realizing the benefits of our investments in Marina Bay Sands.

Turning to our program to return capital to shareholders. We repurchased $800 million of LVS stock during the quarter. We also paid our reoccurring dividend of $0.25 per share. In addition, during the second quarter and in July, we purchased $179 million worth of SCL stock, increasing the company's ownership percentage of SCL to 73.4% as of today. We believe repurchase of LVS equity through our share repurchase program will be meaningfully accretive to the company and its shareholders over the long term. We look forward to continuing to utilize the company's share repurchase program to increase returns to shareholders.

Thanks again for joining the call today. Now let's take questions.

[Operator Instructions] Your first question is coming from Stephen Grambling from Morgan Stanley.

Starting with Macau, I appreciate the acknowledgment of the shortfall somewhat there. But perhaps remind us of how you're thinking about turning the tide from a competitive standpoint and what KPIs or timing investors should maybe be thinking about in terms of seeing some of the market share going in the opposite direction.

I'll take that, Stephen. Thank you for the question. I think around late April, we started to implement a more aggressive customer reinvestment program. And I think we're seeing some encouraging initial results from those increased levels of reinvestment as we get into May and June, the performance of SCL did improve. And I think we will be continuing to adjust to the market conditions as and when necessary. We're also looking at opportunity for us to perform better from our smaller properties, Parisian and Sands. So overall, the reception to Londoner has been phenomenal. I think we're getting exceptional feedback from customers, and that's obviously growing nicely.

But obviously, this quarter is still just the start. All of the rooms, as Patrick referenced, were available from late April. And we intend to continue to yield better at Londoner Macau. So that probably has much further to go. And then the rest of the portfolio, we have to adjust our reinvestment levels according to the product and according to the individual product mix within the property. And I think this process has only just started, and we'll continue to see, I think, improvements in our results as we have done since May and June already. And as you can see, we have a sequential improvement in our mass GGR market share up 8% for the quarter and we intend to drive better improvements and also hopefully recapture that market share in the coming quarters.

So I just want to say one thing, which is we're not where we want to be in Macau. We feel like we've made great investments. We have great products, and we believe we can grow EBITDA from here. We're very focused on it. We realize we have work to do in our reinvestment programs. We have things that we think we can do to be more competitive, and we're going to take some action. And we think we have an approach that we opened in the long run with great growth for us, both on the revenue and EBITDA side.

So maybe one quick follow-up there just on Macau. You said you're not where you want to be, what does that mean for capital allocation in that market? You just have a pretty healthy dividend payout and in that market as a percentage of free cash flow and earnings. If you go -- I mean should we be waiting for that turnaround to see you go back down that path? And if you start paying out a dividend, is that prior kind of ratio, the right way to think about it going forward?

Yes. So I think the key thing is that we've always been focused on return to capital, particularly with the dividend at the SCL level. I think as we see the CapEx roll off from the Londoner, which was a very meaningful investment that we feel will generate cash flow over the long term, and we're happy to make it. But that being said, hopefully, our CapEx profile looks better in the future, as you can see from our CapEx expectations that we published. And so when that happens, we'll look to return to increasing the dividend over time with the support of the SCL Board. But for us, we think that the best use of free cash flow there, other than investing in growth projects is to return it to shareholders. And you've seen how we've handled in the past, and we look forward to doing that again in the future. And I think the levels will be based on our expectations of cash flow production going forward.

Your next question is coming from Shaun Kelley from Bank of America.

For Grant or whoever wants to take it. Maybe we could just start in Macau. We did see across the market a bit of an improvement sequentially as the quarter went on in sort of overall market GGR. We've heard some mixed views about how either promotionally-driven or VIP or event-driven that was. So hoping to get a little bit of color on just what's driving that improvement? How sustainable you think it is and just broader health of the macro in the market right now?

Sure. Thanks for the question, Shaun. I think the market clearly accelerated from May and June, obviously, was a standout performance, I think, helped by the calendar of events that prevailed in June. If you look at the segment breakdown, clearly, as you can see from the DICJ data as well, the rolling -- the VIP segment performed very well during the quarter and was up 26% year-on-year of our estimates. But the non-rolling and the slot win also improved, and we're still in the high single-digit growth region for the quarter. So I think there's some very encouraging signs. I think a mix between improved customer density, but also the calendar events and the offerings by the operators helping to drive the increased patronage as well.

And then -- maybe just to switch gears as a follow-up on Singapore. Rob, obviously, just incredible performance on the numbers, I mean, over $750 million from a single building in a single quarter is kind of hard to wrap your brain around. Can you give us your best stab at how we should think about maybe a run rate or sort of level of productivity for this property moving forward? Are we sustainably above $600 million of EBITDA a quarter? I know -- I think we have a good sense of what your stretch goal here is that $2.5 billion core. But just help us think about it to level set expectations given it wasn't a fairly easy comp on the mass market and obviously, VIP, it can be volatile quarter-to-quarter on the handle side.

It's hard to predict, isn't it? I mean I don't think we forecasted a $770 million quarter. I don't think we have a clear view of it if this is sustainable, if this go forward. It's proving, though, that it would be an amazing market, and we have the best assets by far in the market. So how high is up? And how deep is that well? I don't know. I mean the truth is it'd be very difficult to dismiss these results and say, we are now heading for $2.5 billion, we get to $2.6 billion, $2.7 billion, can I continue? And so it's very hard to predict, it's not an easy market. There's never anything like this in the history of gaming anywhere. You realize this -- at this run rate, it's a $3 billion asset. We don't expect to do that now. I think yes, $2.5 billion is realistic and doable.

But I would not want to venture a guess, I wouldn't want to dismiss the results, but I would overhype them and say, every quarter is 750. I think that's unfair. But could we do 600 million plus or 650 million? Possible, yes. It depends on how strong the economy remains over there and the super high end of the markets there. And we dominate it, and we're kind of alone in that place as far as the super high end. So it could be that we're looking at all the world in Singapore, and we'll have to wait and see, time will tell. We just don't know because we didn't see this coming this early, we thought it would come later, but it's here so deal with it.

Your next question is coming from [ Dan Politzer ] from JPMorgan.

I just -- I wanted to go back and circle on Macau, right? It seems like you guys are going to be more promotional, you're going to get -- be focused on generating that EBITDA level. Is there a target of the EBITDA share that we should think about that kind of gets you to where you want to be just looking at the historical 33% to 35% EBITDA share you've had in that market? Or how should we kind of assess your strategy there and when -- your KPIs for getting back to a level you think is appropriate?

I think we should take this one step at a time. Our goal -- we acknowledge our failure and believing our assets were so strong, we could overcome this very different environment we're used to. We've now jumped the water. We're not [ repeating ] the market, we're simply in the mix. and that's a good thing. I believe our assets -- our short-term goal in the near quarters is to get -- we believe the Londoner and Venetian can generate $2 billion between them. We believe that the Four Seasons will be $300 million plus. I'd say [indiscernible] million plus, making the Sands into $100 million more because things are changing down the Peninsula.

Our short-term goal, my goal and my hope the team shares is that we can get to $2.7 billion run rate and come off the bottom here. As I think at 2.2, 2.3, we're just not performing well. We have the best assets. So 3 things: acceleration of GGR is very helpful. And the most important thing by far is that; second thing is we have the best -- the biggest assets in that town, the most rooms, the best product; and third thing is we've come off our thinking, we changed our thinking. So I'm hoping that Brent and team can see in near future, 600-plus, 650 down the road and get us all the back to the 2.6, 2.7 range. That's our short-term goal. Beyond that, wait until the market matures.

Let's face it, if this market turns on the accelerate at this rate, we might see everyone do much better. That would be the best thing for Macau, but I think it's very possible that happens in '25 even '26, '27. So this is just our acknowledgment that we did not do a good enough job in that environment, and we're doing it now. And we have full faith in our team over there and our assets to perform and get us back in the game.

Got it. That's helpful detail. Just a follow-up on Singapore. Is there any way to kind of wrap our heads around that sudden acceleration in those gaming volumes? Because it does seem like it was pretty concentrated on just the gaming side. And I mean we're trying to parse this out if there was new customers, maybe reception for the property improvement in new suite product, anything in the event calendar. Just trying to make sense of what's obviously typically the seasonally softest quarter of the year here to be so strong.

I think a lot of it has to do with the product. We spent the last couple of years reinvesting there significantly, not only in the physical product, but also in the service levels and the experience that you can provide to people. And the type of customer we are coming through the property and the nature where Singapore sits today, the growing economies [indiscernible] in Southeast Asia. It's just -- it's all working. We have a very strong view on the future of Singapore. And you can see by the type of customers that we have coming in, that is not only a very strong market, but it's very deep. And so for us, yes, there's new customers coming in, they're attracted by what we have on offer. They're coming to Singapore to do business, they're coming to Singapore for leisure travel, and they're showing up on Marina Bay Sands and they're consuming. So it's great, it's a tribute to the team there and the investment that we've made and the way we execute. But really there, it's just a reflection of who's coming into the market and the fact that we provide experiences that are pretty unique, and they're really taking advantage of it.

We're a different building than we were 5 years ago. If you come and visit and you see it, you'll see the differences and realize that we attract a very high level of patron.

I think you also have to give credit to the government of Singapore, which allows us to dream and excel. And what Patrick referenced, that building is in their last week for the groundbreaking of a number of our second building. It's an amazing place but the market is also 4 billion Asian people at the very top end looking for extraordinary experience and assets we have in spades over there. I think that the truth is that building is just the most desirable, it's super high end, and there's lots of -- a lot of people coming to Singapore. And propensity gamble, as you know, is high in that part of the world. So we're just in a very fortunate position. I don't see it changing. I mean we're in a very privileged position and hopefully goes on for quite a long time.

So we are not one to forecast it $600 million, $700 million, $800 million a quarter but we know we're in the right place, the right time with extraordinarily strong assets and excellent government support and a very strong market in terms of Singapore visitation.

I think one other thing that's important to note is we started to see some inklings of this as we started finishing the renovation but now everything is pretty much done. And so we're starting to see the results as we build customer experience and as they get to experience the property and see how it is to be there and the different things that we offer in this new format and it's starting to show results. I mean this is really just a direct result of the completion of the renovation and the type of customers that we can attract with the products that's there now.

Your next question is coming from Brandt Montour from Barclays.

So my first question is on Macau. I think from where we sit, it's sort of hard to -- we see clearly a strengthening of the Chinese consumer in your market and gambling propensity. I was wondering if you could flesh that out a little bit and talk about spend per visit improvement sequentially across either base mass or premium mass. We all kind of thought it would be a premium mass sort of recovery here in May and June. But I'm looking at your slides, it looks like base mass per table actually did better. So maybe you could just provide a little more color on who's spending more where.

Brandt, maybe I'll take that question. I think overall visitation has been very strong. You see the results for April and May were up by over 20% year-on-year. Obviously, a lot of that is driven by the [indiscernible] visitors from the Greater Bay area. But nonetheless, I think that's helping to drive some of the base mass recovery. But no question, I think the acceleration in GGR is still primarily driven by the premium segments. I think this quarter, in particular, the market benefited from some big rolling play, but also at the high end of the premium mass. So I think that those dynamics remain similar to previous quarters, but we're beginning to see also increased level of visitation, albeit more from the Greater Bay Area in terms of [indiscernible]. And of course, from our results as well, sequentially, I think you alluded to it clearly, we grew quite significantly in the base mass on rolling wind against Q1, and that's partly driven by the opening of the Londoner brand.

Okay. That's super helpful. And then just a quick follow-up on Macau. The Londoner result clearly had a nice bounce here in the second quarter, and you alluded to in your prepared remarks that some of the other properties didn't do quite as well. Am I to read between the lines that the Londoner is the property that has received the most incremental reinvestment activity and the other properties have not and that's kind of next up in terms of your sort of blueprint or game plan here? Or is that not the right readthrough?

No, that's not entirely accurate. In terms of our higher reinvestment levels, that just went into the portfolio across the board. I think what we are referencing earlier remarks is that we may need to further and we have to be further adjusting our reinvestment levels during the quarter towards the end of the quarter for some of our smaller properties because we think those products, given the size and the product level, may need recalibration in the reinvestment levels versus the natural action age that is flocking to Londoner and also the strength of the property like Venetian continues to be able to attract customers at all segments.

Your next question is coming from Robin Farley from UBS.

Just going back to the acceleration you talked about in June and Macau. It seems like driven at least fair amount of it by the events calendar. And so how do you get comfortable that it's sustainable as you get past some of the July events and the calendar not being as sustainable in terms of events?

I think, Robin, the calendar is being filled literally every week, every month by all of the different operators, us included, the change from before the pandemic is really every operator is contributing to the event calendar. And of course, the big events brought in whether by us at the Venetian arena, or by our competitor is beneficial to the entire market when we have significant acts. And that will obviously not be a consistent pattern because acts come at different times of the year in different length, duration of play and so on. But you can be sure that the calendar will continue to be filled with great entertainment content. And I think Macau has really been successful in establishing itself as a regional center for entertainment, be it from Greater China artist, Asian artists and even international artists.

Robin, I would just add to Grant's comments that I think it was last year, I wouldn't give us credit in Singapore because Taylor Swift made the whole thing happen. She wasn't available this quarter, we still did pretty well. I think the truth is -- at least she was -- we couldn't gather a comment, she was busy. But the truth is, we have in the cal, yes, lots of events but I've learned over the years, events just rearranged the customer visitations. We don't necessarily create new as much as the rearrangement people come and go. And I think that, that market is showing strength. I mean June results, I think you just see that building. And yes, there's no question that you have a [ Jackie Chung ] and some of these high-end entertainer's help. But again, I think you have to look at the strength of market overall. And I believe it's there.

I haven't been there last month, it looked -- the first time it looked a like pre-pandemic Macau, very strong, lots of people at the tables. I don't believe the entertainers, even special events [indiscernible] create more of this [indiscernible] we arrange when you come. so I wouldn't be that concerned with the event count. Although it's chock-full of events, everyone has entertainment these days and terrific restaurants, et cetera. But I think you have to look at the overall results for the last few months to be very encouraged where Macau appears to be heading.

And for the follow-up, just a quick one. Are you thinking about revisiting what you consider a normal hold percent in Singapore? And I know you just raised it in Q1, but I'm wondering if you're thinking about whether that 3.7% was high enough for normalized hold?

I wouldn't let one quarter drive your thinking. I think you have to stay focused on -- Again, this is a very, very difficult thing for us and other competitors because as you know, [ O percentage ] is a moving target these days driven by who bets, what and how and so it really does move -- as you know, the smart tables have enabled us to see much more clearly a great insight to how the market should perform. Some people move our whole percentage right now until we see more evidence. But it does change with the market and the visitation and the types of best customers made. The old days, it was 2.85, 3.25. That's no longer in [indiscernible], it's now very much a moving target, depending on who's coming, what they're betting, side bets versus front bets. I think we'll come back to you in the future if we need to reassess right now that we're flying where we're at.

Your next question is coming from Joe Stauff from Susquehanna.

Okay. In Singapore, maybe a different attempt to ask a similar question that we've heard earlier on the call, but can I ask about just sort of mass gaming revenue and how strong it was? Is that simply a function of better hold? Is it increased visitation? It's admittedly another question to just try to how to -- try to benchmark with the newer product that you have in Singapore how strong this number could be. Obviously, VIP is a separate category, different level of volatility. But how much -- is there any way to disaggregate this number a little bit more for understanding?

I hate to say this, I'd like to answer, but it's very difficult for us to do it as well as you. When you do $843 million, up 97% in pre-pandemic and 40% higher year-on-year. It's hard for us to get our hands around it. But there's also a lot of people showing up in all these segments and gambling outsized amounts of money. And your question is a fair one. I wish we had better answers. And how deep is the well, how high can this thing go? We're confused ourselves by it because we expected 2.5. But now I think we can say -- we can achieve it this year. And I think it's a combination of incredible market incredible access to people want to get there, the [ visa ] situation is helpful. And I think you're seeing the results of very, very superlative results into the building. The building is just unique and special. And there's lots of products.

So I know it's difficult and I hear your frustration. We share it over -- we don't want to exaggerate this and say we'll run $3 billion. We also don't want to underplay, we want to except the fact that it happened and it's happened now two quarters a row of strong results, opening for a similar second half of the year. And it's hard to model. I'd be blunt with you. I think one thing I would say is when you say mass gaming, premium mass gaming is alive well in those numbers. These are non-rolling, very high rolling -- don't consider this, people betting $1,000 an in, this premium mass segment, which is in that 847 number, 843 is a lot of very, very high-end non-rollers which is different than past Macau.

So I appreciate the commentary. Your question is very fair. I wish we had more insightful answer. We keep watching this thing and saying we lost a quarter it was amazing, but just kept coming and I think I'll just keep coming in Singapore. When we beat the customers, a different issue was 3.7 or 3.3, we never could know. But if the volumes look strong. And to me, it appears like [indiscernible] may last for a long time.

Got you. And then maybe a follow-up. Formula One is pushed in the fourth quarter in Singapore this year versus September last. What's the right way to think about whether or not the rest of the building can absorb that normal activity? Or is -- do you view that as a bit of a headwind?

Formula One is always a great event for Singapore. It's something that we fully support. We're an integral part of and we always welcome it. And I think our patients really enjoy it. A lot of visitors show up at Singapore because of this event. And for us, whenever it happens, it's great. So if it's third quarter, fourth quarter, we're happy with it. We do our best to support the initiative around it because we think it's great for Singapore. It's great for Marina Bay Sands and the type of customers that show up are always very helpful. But in terms of being able to accommodate customers in Q3 or during Golden Week with Formula One, it's fine. Either way it works.

Your next question is coming from Chad Beynon from Macquarie.

Wanted to go back to Macau, Rob, you mentioned 2.7 as the near-term North Star and hopefully, that eventually moves kind of back to 3. But wanted to approach it from a margin standpoint. So Londoner had nice improvement in margin. The collective was down 80 basis points, as you guys called out. And the flow-through was obviously negative here for the quarter. But does margin matter as much in terms of how you're thinking about running the business or given some of the commentary that we've spoken about with promos, maybe we shouldn't have a margin target in mind, just because of simple inflation and different approach towards promo? Or is that still the case to get to closer to a 40% margin long term?

So I think the key thing about Macau is that there's a very large fixed cost base in our property portfolio. And so our margin is going to be determined by how much revenue we can push through these buildings. And so if our promotional activity, if our customer reinvestment makes us a little less competitive and we have less revenue, our margins will be impacted. So I think for us, ex old, right, if you ignore the impacts of old, if we continue to have the best properties where we have great offerings for our customers and great experiences and then we reinvest in a more market competitive way, we think we'll still have the ability to drive revenue at an import rate margin. And so if you look at the margin regime where we are today, that's okay for now. But as we grow revenues to grow the business, over time, there might be some opportunity for some upside. But I don't think we're looking at a specific EBITDA margin in terms of our reinvestment guidance. Our reinvestment guidance is going to be based on the market and hopefully, we'll grow revenues based on our product portfolio.

We put a whole lot of new products into the market this last quarter. right? The Londoner Grand is a whole new building. And the casino performance there has been great. We have tremendous slot performance coming out of the Londoner total portfolio. And I think for us, as you Grant, as you heard Rob mentioned before, we have some work to do. That being said, we think there's opportunities in the Parisian. We think there's opportunities in the Four Seasons and even downtown at the Sands we think there's opportunity. So while we keep pushing the Venetian and the Londoner, our segmentation has different reinvestment requirements. And we're going to keep looking at it and evaluating the segmentation across the different properties to ensure that we can optimize for revenue growth and cash flow growth. And so we're not targeting a specific EBITDA margin, but will leave over time as we have the opportunity to grow revenues, the margin will [ follow ].

So margin does matter, but EBITDA matters more. And in any business, you've got to be sensitive to the environment you're playing in, and the environment there has changed. And we weren't excited [indiscernible]. So now we only adjust that coupled with our strong assets and you add that to a growing resurging in GGR. I think you have a good formula. But Obviously, we always want to be margin sensitive, but we want to be EBITDA sensitive too. So it's a combination -- it's not a simple question to answer, each building performs differently.

And then the news that we've seen in terms of the movement from the Thai cabinet withdrawing the bill at this point for legalized casinos, I guess there's probably no update from your end because we're probably reading the same information, but anything to talk about there or any other potential developments that you guys plan to pursue outside of the two markets that you're in?

I think we're constantly looking at new development growth opportunities [ in these ] jurisdictions. We're evaluating them as they come along. It's something that we feel like in Thailand, there's a great opportunity there. if the legal framework and the regulatory framework is appropriate, it's something we'll definitely look at and consider. As of right now, as you just mentioned, there's not a whole lot to think about.

Thailand is the greatest opportunity in Asia or what's left of those countries. But it's so hard to travel [indiscernible] day-to-day, it changes, but it certainly is for anybody in our industry, a very important place, if it ever actually come to fruition.

Your next question is coming from Lizzie Dove from Goldman Sachs.

You mentioned earlier that the goal of the Londoner is to move towards the goal of $1 billion in annualized EBITDA. Curious, timing of that, how much more reinvestment kind of promotions are needed to get there and more so just the cadence to get there?

I think we only just started ramping up the property. I mean, if you think about the Londoner Grand, it really only fully launched in May onwards. So we're still in the very early innings of the ramp-up in Londoner. And we're already running close to $800 million annualized. So we do see opportunity to yield higher and higher across all of the hotels in Londoner Macau, but especially Londoner Grand. I think Patrick just referenced there, we're seeing exceptional slog in [ ETG ] performance out of Londoner already, way surpassing what this building was achieving in 2019. And I think we're seeing high levels of non-rolling table performance as well. And so as all these segments continue to grow, and we put higher quality customers into the suites and the rooms we will get to that $1 billion annualized that Rob referenced. That's the goal. We don't know exact timing, but we're pretty much only at the very start of the ramp-up of the property.

Got it. That makes sense. And then just going back to the promotionality side of things. Obviously, it's something you've been kind of ramping up over the last couple of months. I'm curious what you've seen from other players and how the competitive environment has involved whether they've responded with same level of promotionality, whether there's been irrationality at all in the market, just what you're kind of broadly seeing in the response to that?

The market continues to be very competitive. I don't think the intensity is dropping at all. Each operator is fighting for a greater share of the pie. And the main difference, of course, this quarter is that we also are in the mix now in terms of reinvestment levels back to the customer. And we see the response and we see the initial signs are encouraging. And of course, is more biased towards the high-end segments where the levels of customer investment is shifting the players back to our properties or we're gaining new customers, especially through the Londoner. So that process will continue and we'll continue to evaluate. But we don't expect the competitive dynamics to ease off. I think that will continue to be intense. But of course, a high level of GGR and acceleration in the market growth will help all of us like Rob mentioned, that's still the single biggest factor in determining the results of not just outperformance but of the whole market.

Your next question is coming from George Choi from Citigroup.

So over the past several months, we've seen you guys took the side bets from Marina Bay Sands and introduced them to your Macau operations. And just recently, we saw you guys added a progressive jackpot to your background [indiscernible] in Macau, and we believe that those also run in from Marina Bay Sands Basins. So my question is, do you still have any best practices at Marina Bay Sands that your Macau operations can learn from?

It's work in progress, George. Obviously, we trade mission back and forth based on best practices, and we saw a lot of extent in Singapore with side bets, and I think we'll see it in Macau and we continue, as you know, ahead of us, you're still on top of this, it's [ ripened ], but congratulations.

I think the truth is we're learning as we go. I'm a firm believer that these markets aren't that different in terms of customer activity. And I think in the end, you'll see a lifetime result in Macau in time. It's newer to Macau market, [indiscernible] no longer approved there. But we're really confident that this new era of smart tables, side bets which is increasing whole percentage for everyone, all of our competitors as well, is highly positive for the industry and exciting for the customers. So time will tell how long it takes to see the increased hold percentage and how much they move towards side bets. But we're big believers in this. We're trying to be very innovative, as you alluded to in your comments, and how we view the markets and gambling. It's changing every day. We want to be leaders in that evolving process.

Your next question is coming from David Katz from Jefferies.

I wanted to start with Singapore where there's obviously significant investment coming for further expansion. And things have started to finally really go well in the core building and frankly, you've been waiting for it for a few years. I want to make sure when there isn't construction disruption or what, if anything, just to make sure could sort of impact the momentum that you have there in Singapore?

So just a couple of things. The site is adjacent to Marina Bay Sands. So in the renovation work we did at Marina Bay Sands in the prior years that you referenced, it was actually an actively unoperated building while we were doing it. So it's a little bit like changing your tires in the middle [indiscernible] while you're driving. And so we did that. And so the good news is the building is in terms of suite renovation, the interior is complete, and we're starting to see the benefits of that and the results this quarter. our expansion, and we actually had the groundbreaking last week, Dr. [indiscernible] was there, Rob was there, Grant was there, I was there, some other members of the LVS management team with us. And most importantly, the Prime Minister and the Minister of [indiscernible] responsible for our portfolio was there, and it was an amazing groundbreaking and we're very happy to have the government support, and we're very fortunate to be in Singapore. And so this is a very important complex for tourism for both leisure and business tourism in the market. And for us, any disruption is something we take really seriously. And so the good news is we have a little bit more than [indiscernible] residing directly next door and it's all on site. And so when we build this, ultimately, there will be connections back to renovate [ bands ]. But during the construction, it's not going to impact our ability to conduct operations. So unlike the renovation we just did, this is something separate in the state. And then we'll bridge over to it during the construction process, but it won't be disruptive.

Perfect. And if I can ask one quick follow-up on the strategic evolution in Macau. You talked about reinvestment rates. But I wanted to ask about credit and whether that's a tool that you would be using and how that starts to show up, does it sort of show up maybe later on? And on the cost side of the equation, is there any of that in there that we should be keeping our eye out for?

No. I think in terms of the credit base play is a very small portion of our overall GGR traditionally. And we've been doing this for two decades. We extend credit to some premium patrons in the direct rolling programs. But it has been a consistent practice of ours and we are very experienced in it. but it's not a significant part of the GGR.

Your next question is coming from John DeCree from CBRE.

I wanted to ask one about your retail mall portfolio, particularly retail sales. We're seeing a little bit of acceleration in Mainland China. It looks like in Macau, you've seen a little bit of lift in the 2Q as well. We got a lot of questions about the sustainability of GGR growth, which you fielded already today. But curious if you could give us some thoughts on what you're seeing in the retail mall, particularly on the luxury side of things.

Thanks for the question. The retail mall tenant sales are starting to see a good recovery in the second quarter. So we were in positive tenant sales year-on-year basis. We've grown by about 10% across the retail mall portfolio in Macau. And within that, Luxury is still relatively weaker versus the rest of the portfolio. But we did start to see within the quarter, signs that even the luxury sales were improving partly because also we have been introducing some pretty amazing flagship stores in some of the key luxury brands in the portfolio. So you'll continue to see that being a feature of the Four Seasons more into the beginning of 2026. So there are some improvements that we are making ourselves that should help to lift the luxury sales portion of the mall. But overall, we're happy to see that the mall is back in a positive sales territory, double-digit growth in the second quarter compared to last year.

Maybe if I could follow up with one big picture question about visitation. So visitation from Mainland ex Guangdong, which you highlighted in your slide deck is kind of sluggish to recovery relative to the day trippers in the Bay Area. Given your room base in Macau, it seems like this is probably a pretty big opportunity. So curious your views if there's an opportunity and what can be done to kind of help Macau start to penetrate deeper into Mainland and see some of that visitation outside of Guangdong and come back?

It's a great question. I think Dan and his deck has the breakout of the province's visitation as compared to 2019 is on Page 20 of the deck. I think what you see is, yes, you're right, overall, excluding Guangdong, the recovery of visitation still lagging. But within that, it's very uneven. So some of the wealthier coastal provinces and the major cities, we are seeing recovery beyond the 2019 visitation levels. and some of the other provinces are lagging much more significantly. So I agree it is an opportunity. And I think Macau and the operators are continuously doing the destination marketing roadshows across the different parts of Mainland China as well as overseas, and that will continue. Transportation is continuing to improve in terms of pricing and connectivity. And of course, the availability of hotel rooms and of course, we've been adding high-quality inventory as have some other operators as well. So we expect all of those factors to drive better penetration in the non-Guangdong visitation numbers, especially helping to drive that overnight visitation, which is clearly the higher spending segment. But that said, the overall hotel inventory in Macau is not significantly growing. So that will continue to add as a constraint on the overall overnight visitation. But I think what you see is a continued improvement in the quality of the tourism coming to stay overnight in Macau.

Your next question is coming from Steve Wieczynski from Stifel.

Most of my questions have been answered. So just one for me. So Rob or Patrick, I mean, as we think about Singapore and Patrick, you mentioned -- you guys just started construction on IR2. But based on what you've witnessed over the last 6 months, 8 months coming out of IR1 and the kind of the crazy numbers that you guys have been putting up over there out of IR1. Has that changed your internal return assumptions for IR2 at this point?

I don't think so. Look, I think we generally have a view that Marina Bay Sands in Singapore is an investment-driven story. And so the more we invest in high-quality assets, the better service levels we have, the more we're going to have pricing power, the more we're going to be able to differentiate our products and the more high-value tourism we'll be able to bring it. And because of that, we'll get more revenue, we get more EBITDA. So you're seeing that happen this quarter in Singapore. It's the full product -- the full power of our suite products. the full power of our food and beverage offerings, our [ MICE ] offerings. Everything is really coming together, all the entertainment we do, a high level of service. But we have a great premium mass customer base there. Look, the shopping, all the other things that we've added -- it's really a very unique lifestyle program that we offer to people. And so for us, IR2 is just an extension of that.

Look, our goal is to have the best hotel in the world there. To have the best gaming experience, the best food and beverage and then have this live entertainment venue, the likes of which we've never had before in terms of to be able to drive customer visitation. So we feel very strongly about this. It's a $6 billion investment, $2 billion of premium that we have to pay to the government, and we feel very strongly about the quality of that investment and where it can go. So adjustment in models is not where we're at now. It's a very long way away. We've got a couple of years before [indiscernible]. But in our mind, this quarter, and actually, to be fair, what we'll be seeing in the quarters leading up to this in terms of the high quality of patron that we have just validates the fact that we feel very strongly this will be a high-quality investment. And so while we haven't adjusted our models in any formal way, I think this just validates long term in our minds, the quality of the market and the strength of Singapore.

Thank you. That completes our Q&A session. Everyone, this concludes today's event. You may disconnect at this time, and have a wonderful day. We thank you for your participation.

All 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. It was great to talk to you.

Let's maybe just start with the uncertain macro world we find ourselves with and then we'll get a little bit more on to your long-term strategy.

[indiscernible]

So I mean, I guess if we look at your share price, much like most of the stocks I look at, you're kind of in your round trip $42 down to $32, back up to $42 again. Has that reflected what you've seen internally? 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 and never made the rebound the same way the U.S. did. 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 China market. But 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 and it's been a market we've struggled with a bit. And we opened Londoner in full a few months ago. So hopefully, that will help our business. But 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. But 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 in the Trump tariff era.

Okay. No, that makes sense. And maybe just you sort of beat the elements of deglobalization risk. Maybe if you can just talk to that. You're a U.S.-listed firm, operating primarily in Asia.

Not primarily, 100%.

Sorry, 100%.

Not primarily -- we are a Singapore and Macau-driven business and...

Do you see any risks associated with that relationship? Or do you think that you're seen as a local business?

Even from a China perspective or how investors view us, no, I think -- I mean, we'd love to be in the U.S. at some point. We have tried and failed. But I don't think there's much risk associated with not being having a business here. We had obviously built and started in Las Vegas 30 years ago with the Venetian, sold that to Apollo and VICI a while back. But no, I don't think there's any real risk 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 of, 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 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. Number of people made comments but I've never seen it in Beijing or Macau affecting -- or Singapore. 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. It hasn't impacted our business at this point. No.

Okay. Let's dial in on Macau and then we'll swing back to Singapore. You mentioned it earlier, visitation levels still down on where we were in 2019. Is that macro? Is there anything structural going on there? What's your sort of optimism that things can get better in terms of?

Well, 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. Yes. 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. So the market is kind of -- it had a nice rebound there post-COVID [ 15 to 18 ] and then to [ 22 ] and then it's kind of peaked to [ 27, 28 ]. And right now, appears to be flat at that number. We'll see how May comes out. But there's not -- we had -- I had a false belief a couple of years ago that Macau would just keep moving up into the [ 30s ] and beyond. I think there'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. And it's -- whatever reason you want to assign to it, Macau has definitely stalled out. It's not where it was. Obviously, pre-COVID, the demise of the junket segment didn't help. And the competition is fierce there. And I think long term, I still believe Macau will be in the [ 32 ] and actually [ 34 ] and -- but it's not happening imminently. It's not happening today or tomorrow. So we are kind of struggling in Macau. In fact, visitation has recovered but spend has not.

And then just your thoughts around the recent holiday travel in China with Golden Week and...

Yes, it was a very powerful -- May is going to be, I think, I haven't seen numbers, obviously, not out yet. But I assume May will be a very positive outcome for the year. GGR in Macau has looked very good, I think, up single digit but up. And clearly, we saw a strong Golden Week, the whole market. You saw the numbers come out. Visitation spend, it was a very -- 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.

So is that -- that's a sign that things are getting better?

Yes. I don't know. It ebbs and flows. Tuesday looks better and Friday looks worse. And there's no consistency. Again, I'd plead guilty to believing the market would have a steady ascent into the $32 billion and $34 billion GGR range and 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 base 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 has held up in this rather difficult time.

Look at the retail numbers, luxury and other, they're pretty soft. So I'm hoping for a better day and we've got to do better within the parameters of the market today. We've not done as well as we could have done competitively. And our last quarter was disappointing. So we're 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 [ go-go ] [indiscernible] market was pre-COVID.

And then in terms of sort of regional breakdown there, is the weakness coming from all over China? Or is the sort of the neighboring provinces stronger high end versus low end, the sort of VIP is softer.

I don't think you can break it out that way. The market has 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. But 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 is in a different place than it was. So it's a myriad of factors but the aggregate result is a more challenging market to operate in.

And then what about Macau as attracting visitors from outside of China? Like is that an opportunity? I guess it's been primarily a Chinese market for you but is there a way to promote that to the wider world?

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 is. It really is. Sheldon once said, 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. But 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 for Japanese, Korean, Indonesian, Malaysia. It should. It should be. Like Singapore, it should be much more attractive. But there's been impediments. I think the airport now being accessible by the road makes a lot of sense. The old days, the ferry was difficult. But it hasn't grown as fast as I think it could and it will.

Okay. Wonderful. And then maybe let's talk about -- it's a softer market but you've been investing. You're making a considerable amount of capital investments into Macau. What kind of returns are you expecting on those? Those are completed now. Is that right? And what...

Londoner is fully open. We never stopped. I mean, Macau is like the old Brooklyn Bridge joke, it needs repainting all the time and you start and you stop. So we're constantly doing R&M on the Venetian now and the Parisian. Four Seasons is done. The Londoner is done but we're constantly investing. We believe in Macau long term. We believe in 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, you'll see some good results of Londoner. But we still remain believers in investing in quality and scale and that will never change. Singapore, the same way. We said 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 because we've been outperformed by other people.

Okay. And then hotel capacity in Macau still?

Strong, very strong. It's not about filling rooms in -- 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 and let's face, it is 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 to make sure that mix is more favorable to our results where we want to get to.

And is there scope to add more properties in Macau, is it over in -- I might be pronouncing this wrong [indiscernible]

[indiscernible] Yes. The government has made this -- I don't think you'll see gaming properties mentioned. 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 don't think they'll opt for that. It's not the right time. They would like to opt for more nongaming hotel-based facilities. That would make great sense. But I don't see gaming hotels opening in Macau anytime soon.

Is nongaming of any interest to you at all?

Yes, yes. No, we need more -- everybody needs -- well, it works in tandem, doesn't it? Nongaming brings gaming. So when you have sleeping rooms, they bring gamblers and they bring more people to retail and to food and beverage and entertainment. So absolutely, nongaming 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 so Macau is much -- 25%, 30% of that. It could use more sleeping rooms because it's got the biggest market in the world. It's got China at its doorstep with 1 billion plus, 1.3 billion. No question in my mind that more -- if you had more sleeping rooms in Macau of every type, it can be base mass, it can be super high end, super high -- every type of room is valuable to driving more gaming revenue. Sure.

And would you ever see an opportunity in Mainland China?

We've looked -- as I recall 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 can be helpful to our Macau properties. Hard to -- it's not easy.

And then I just got a question here from the audience but obviously, kind of going back to Vegas, where profits have increasingly come from nongaming activities. Is that something you expect to take place in Macau as well?

Well, Macau always has been very strong nongaming. The retail revenue there is astounding. Our mall business, not recently but what's happened in retail in general. But typically, our nongaming 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 nongaming market with the advent of higher room rates and the realization that we started 30 years ago when Sheldon first prophesied that there'd be a convention-based nongaming value, people fell down laughing at us. We opened The Venetian in '99 and room rates skyrocketed. And 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.

But 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 another Las Vegas. They'll never be another Macau. You can't -- the $50 billion, $60 billion, $70 billion that's been invested in Macau in the last 20 years is unbelievable. And Vegas has become a juggernaut of investment and it's a one-of-a-kind place. Like it or not, you may like Las Vegas, you may not like it but it's one of a kind. It's a unique property, unique place. And Macau, very similar. It's just smaller in terms of scale but newer. And Macau is very impressive. where it started from back in the '90s to where it's at today, it's an amazing progression of quality and quantity.

And then just another question from the audience here. What would need to happen for spend per visit to recover?

That is the brightest place you've ever seen. I think [indiscernible]

It was my second one.

I think I was asked where I was on Friday night, when they -- we got killed.

We want to...

So unbelievable.

We're trying to interrogate you.

I know I never stay there. I always, like one of the 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 need to happen for spend per visit to recover? Is it purely just Macau and Macau.

I think it's like a better economy would help it, a better confidence level. I mean the world is in a 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 going to happen? I believe if you have a relationship with China and the U.S., working together, the world economy suffers. We all suffer. This ridiculous idea that we're going to make -- we're going to exist on our own is insane. I mean we've got to have a trade. We've got to have a relationship with China and we have a relationship with the world. I mean we're not -- it can't be America only or China only.

So I think the world is kind of watching, waiting, concerned, you see it in equity prices, you see it in people's consumer confidence, 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. So I think until people get more of a certainty of what tomorrow is going to bring and it was going pretty well until this whole -- 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 U.S. work things out together. And hopefully, there can be resolution. President Trump and President Xi can figure that out.

Very clear. Right. I'm going to ask you all the same questions again, Singapore.

Singapore is very different.

Yes. Well, maybe let's set the scene then. So tell us where we are in Singapore.

Well, we're -- life I'd cycles and those of us who lived 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, 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 square foot in real estate there is astronomical. The market is hot as a pistol. And 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 EBITDAs we have. And I think our last quarter was in excess of [ 600 ]. I expect to see more of that in the future, [ 600 ], maybe [ 700 ] in the future. Our business in Singapore is powerful and it's not based on a multisegment. It's based on very top-tier luxury segment of customers. 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 is very strong. Our base mass, our slot business is trending at $1 billion top line this year, which is astounding.

Singapore is in 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 a 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 #2, which will be open probably sometime in early part of the '30s. But look, Singapore is -- I wish Sheldon has seen it. We built Singapore for $5.8 billion. And the guessing was, could it do $300 million, $500 million, $1 billion? The fact it probably will get to $2.5 billion run rate this decade is astounding. And the post-COVID trajectory of GGR in that market is astounding. Our business is terrific and we're thrilled to be there.

And obviously, $600 million of EBITDA from one property is pretty extraordinary in the hotel world. And you're adding a second property. Obviously, you mentioned it there. Maybe just give us some details there. It's not quite marina, makes sense to -- it's a little bit more modern.

No, no. It just costs more. It's very extravagant. My friend's hotel business always laughed at the cost per key. It's only 550 keys. It's cost in the somewhere in the $8 billion range. I know it sounds very expensive because it is. But I also think the market there will pay for that kind of product. And again, you're 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. But again, the fact we are open for probably 5, 6 years.

Maybe just a question again about the nongaming revenue in Singapore. 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 -- whether it's retail, restaurants, entertainment, everything, price is higher. I just bought a room for somebody as a gift. When I got [indiscernible] I was astounded in Singapore how much does it cost for our base room. But the fact is Singapore is for affluent people that can afford it, whether it's the gaming product, the hotel product, the retail, the food and beverage, everything is expensive. But 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. It's paid off very, very well. Our strategy in Singapore is 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.

And one of the trends we've seen in Singapore is this side bets, prevalence of side bets. What is the sort of upside opportunity from that? Maybe you can sort of talk about where that came from?

Yes. So gambling, if people understand side bets, they get very emotional about what it means. It's very simple. There's just higher risk to the customer and higher reward for the house. And we've always been a proponent in making side bets in the -- we're a baccarat company. Dan Briggs always calls us the ABC, the Asian baccarat company, which I love that because it's 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 not know, has for years been a rather boring 2.7%, 2.8% house advantage. If you're a flat betting house, advantage is miniscule, if you're flat betting banker player. The minute you add derivatives, side bets, they're bad bets for the customer. Let's call it what it is. 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. But I think these bets are akin to -- they're prop bets. You watch the Super Bowl and you can bet one team or the other, that's fine but you bet the prop bets. Sports betting today is a bad bet for the companies, for DraftKings, Flutter, et cetera, the flat bets when you bet the Cubs versus the Phillies, not very exciting for the house. The money is in the side bets. That's -- that's true of any industry, in gambling. And 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. And when you're doing in billions of dollars of money we take in from revenue from baccarat, if we can drive the perf 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 1,000 years ago and I worked for a guy who was a finance person, 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 went at USD 100,000. And the guy I worked for panicked. He said, Rob, you can't -- it's crazy. You never -- 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. And he said, well, what does the customer think? I said, that's the customer. He's hearing me. I'm telling it's a dumb bet. 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.

And we're trying to find ways of -- and the whole industry is doing this. They're trying to find people that -- we field all kinds of different games, side bets, different names. But in the end, it's about giving the customers what they want and when they bet on that adds more advantage to the house. So right now, the -- 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 doesn't change, the dealers don't change. The costs remain the same but the house advantage drives your winnings and your flow-through on 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 is betting. So imagine if you know your customers' habits, the point where it's not done for you, not a pit boss or a floor man writing it down. If he has a bad bet, he doesn't pay attention, you lose the bet.

This way, you know exactly what the customer is wagering, 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. So 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. So the advantages, I think, for baccarat is, over the time we've been experimenting with it, we've driven the pur up. But the fact is it could get as high as 4-plus percent, which would be astronomical for a company like ours. And that's a real hidden value of our company because, again, we are the ABC company.

And why is this an opportunity in Singapore that 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 allow us to do things there and try it. But 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 going to see a side betting in Macau become very important. It's very important in Singapore. But the markets in me are very similar. I know people think there's different habits. I don't believe. I think in the end, a gambler given the option to gamble will pick -- look at the table and make his own decision. But in the end, Macau and Singapore are very similar in terms of appetite for side wagers.

And then what synergies do you see between being in the 2 locations? Like how many cross guests do you have across the 2 locations?

We have a lot, but we don't really -- because of the way the laws are set in Macau, we don't cross market as much as you think. We're not able to share information and data. We're very careful to isolate Macau at the request of the government. So the cross-marketing is important. I also believe that's overstated in terms of -- the customers are intelligent. They know where to go, where they want to go and they'll -- they -- most Mainlanders will prove -- will choose Macau over Singapore but the greater Asia region will choose Singapore over Macau.

Okay. 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. What determines who's winning there? What are they doing better? Or what are you doing better? What's the [indiscernible]

[indiscernible] I look at the EBITDA numbers and I get -- it bothers me. We're not doing as well in Macau as we could. But in the end, what drives it in Macau has always been a market predicated on product, on rooms and quality and food and the gambling is always just -- the product drove the revenue. What's happened is it's 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. And my hats 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 ask for the margin. They ask how much money you have. So we make more EBITDA, we'll be happier than making higher margins.

So we got to rethink who we are and respect our assets but also respect the customer is being sought after by many different entities and you've got to compete and you've got to be market sensitive. And frankly, we haven't been. We haven't been good enough. And our Macau numbers are disappointing to me. And as good as Singapore is, Macau should be doing better. If Macau is doing what it should be doing, we'd be in a $5.5 billion of cumulative EBITDA, which will put us where we want to be.

So maybe just to square those comments. So you're saying that the quality of the product is marginally, a little bit less in Macau but you're investing in upgrading your products.

Well, we're always going to 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 is, product is 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. And look, you can -- we sat back thinking this would change and we were wrong. I was wrong. We can pontificate what people, how they should run their business. But if they're making more money than you, then shame on you, then get in the game and stop complaining and that's what we need to do. We need to be more aggressive in Macau, making more money and that's our driving force in our company, which has been. No one pays you for margin. No one pays you for pretty buildings if they don't produce EBITDA.

Fair enough. And then maybe just a comment on what products are resonating at the moment. You've got a kind of range of branded products, very, very high-end, sort of exclusive products. You've got some themed products. I think it's fair to say. 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 2?

I think you can do theming in luxury. I mean the Londoner is the embodiment of both. It's a heavily themed product. I mean you can't -- you call it the Londoner, you're kind of the theme business, aren't you? But 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. And I think -- whereas Singapore is much more of a nonthemed architectural icon type product, which is also nonthemed but very luxurious. And the Four Seasons in Macau is same thing, nonthemed uber luxurious. But our mainstay has always been the Venetian, which is heavily themed. And some would say theming is a negative thing. It depends on what markets you're in. It worked very well. 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.

So clearly, theming works in some markets. And it depends what your -- in Vegas, the '90s theme was essential. Sheldon and I once went to a dinner with a bunch of investors and some guys said, "What's your theme going to be in Las Vegas, Mr. Adelson? " My theme is making money. He said, I'm in the moneymaking theme. And whatever goddamn thing it takes to make money, I'll do that. And it was very fun. The guy got very offended and he said he's very [ course ]. I tell you, you haven't seen [ course ]. That's not. That's an appetizer. He's a tough guy but he was right. He said the theme will work. And we landed on Venetian because we thought at that time that probably 99% of Americans who didn't have a passport have been to Venice.

So we created this make-believe fancy what Venice was. It was beautiful and it was a great success. There were those who thought theming is antiquated. I don't subscribe to that. Londoner just opened and it's themed. 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 Macau. What are the hurdles left for Sands to move into sports?

No, no, we're going to -- we're doing an NBA game this fall. No hurdles. We made a deal with the NBA. Patrick owns the team in Dallas and we're moving forward to doing NBA in Macau, which is very desirable there. People want to see the NBA. Years ago, we did a deal with ManU for a football -- English football game there and all people told us no one wants to see English football. So we didn't hold enough tickets for the casino and we put them on sale next day and all 20,000 tickets were gone in 20 minutes. And I said, yes, that tells us how much we got 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 6 or 7 next couple of years. They have a voracious appetite for sports over there. Yes. So we'll keep doing all this, entertainment, NBA, et cetera.

But what about particularly sports gambling?

Sports, I don't think that's in the cards right now. I think there's a sports gambling group. I think it's been there for years but it's not material and we've never offered to be in that business. Of course, we'd love to be. But I don't think sports betting is going to happen in Macau in the foreseeable future beyond the small -- there's one outpost right now, I forget what's called, that does it in a very minor way. But on a major scale like Las Vegas, no, I don't see it.

Okay. Okay. And then what about company's 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're experimenting with something right now. The problem is, we're late to the game. Online is very complicated and very competitive, very hard to breakthrough. So I -- 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. And at this point, people lost a lot of money trying to be -- it's not an easy business. Sports betting has turned out to be a -- not profitable at this point. And online is only in a couple of -- it's like 4 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 the first movers way ahead of us.

Okay. What about -- you talked about smart tables earlier. I mean maybe you can just talk about maybe what is a smart table. That would be interesting for some people. And really, what is that enhancing for you? You're talking about the side bets. Is that more...

It's incredibly good for the industry for a couple of things. Smart table is nothing more than -- you've got the ability -- the table -- smart maybe the wrong term, it's really more of a technology approach where you can see all the hands. And 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 -- or taken aside. So counterfeiting, it eliminates that. It eliminates cheating because you can see everything is being recorded, all the hands. If someone is playing games, the dealer internally or externally are working together, it eliminates all cheating in that. 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 once you bet, a person betting a lot of money on a flatbed is not nearly as important as a person who bet a lot of money on a nonflatbed or 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 complementaries back to them. It also gives you a chance 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, the floor man, the pit boss to watch the game. The game basically watches itself. And it also makes sure all the fills, everything is done properly in terms of the accounting on the game. I mean they're expensive machines but they're going to revolutionize gaming. And I think you'll see them -- it will be in every place in a short time. They're too important not to be, especially in a high-volume environment like Asia.

And what is the rollout as of the moment?

We're basically done in this year in both jurisdictions, Macau and Singapore.

So [indiscernible] there, hopefully or they're where you want to be.

Yes. No, they're doing great. And the reception -- customers like them. I think there's a sense of comfort, there's a sense of awareness. They get the raise done properly. Customers seem to gravitate to smart tables.

Okay. Wonderful. What about -- is there any other innovations, technological innovations, maybe on slots or anything on the other side that you're going out.

No. Basically, a smart table -- table games emulates the slot experience. It gives you the ability to process information -- it's basically a slot machine's table game. It gives you incredible -- in the old days in Atlantic City, 100 years ago, 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, last 10 years, table games have started to catch up from a technology perspective. And I think the smart table is the epitome of that technology, which is both valuable for security, counterfeiting, rating customers, new bets. It's a amazing progression in the right direction. And especially in Asia, which is table game predominant.

So let's move on to sort of new opportunities. I think I'm...

Short meeting.

Well, maybe to start with maybe the framework then. 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.

Yes, I was going to -- I guess, if I very quickly try and do the math on what you said about Marina Bay Sands, it's a great property. It's not making 20% on the $5.8 billion.

No, no, making much more.

It's making more.

Well, it's making -- I can't do the math but $2.5 billion, let's say, $2.4 billion on $5.8 billion.

[indiscernible]

Look, it's been an amazing investment. And so is Macau. The problem today is in the world, those opportunities are short. There's nothing for us in Europe. The U.S., we just left New York, which may have been one of the great last opportunities. There's nothing happening in Texas right now. The only thing in the world to interest us in Asia would be Thailand, which is -- we don't know what's going to happen there. It's really early days. But Thailand would give you, I think, a chance because the CapEx, OpEx in Thailand is huge advantage to the operator. If you've been to Thailand, the numbers are spectacular. I saw a project there that looks like Hudson Yards here, except it cost $4 billion versus whatever Hudson Yards cost, which I assume is more like $14 billion or whatever it was. But you can build cheaper in Thailand, you can operate cheaper. If they can get the legislation right, that's going to be a great market for somebody.

And what about Singapore? Is 2 properties the right number then? Obviously, you're building the second one. Could there be a room for third? Or is that very hard to predict?

I wouldn't talk about that today because I think we get to # 2 is enough. 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 2 properties and again, these 2 properties for a long time.

Okay. So with limited opportunities out there to grow.

Yes.

Capital allocation, you obviously invest -- reinvest and upgrade the properties. So you're looking really to capital returns. You're seeing a [indiscernible]

Yes. If we don't find other opportunities, we're going to be making billions and billions of dollars with no place to spend it. So we'll simply put it back, obviously, fix the houses, fix the properties but then put the money back to investors. The dividends or buy back shares. We've been buying back shares aggressively. We keep buying back shares and we'll keep doing that until the price gets better or maybe beyond that. But we have a -- the days of us thinking there's endless opportunity to grow are over. I don't 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 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 is a [indiscernible] to complete. It may not happen. We don't know.

So what are the hurdles in Bangkok, is it just [indiscernible]

Oh, god, how many hurdles you want. You've got to approve the legislation. It's got to be local friendly so the 70 million Thais can get in. At one point, they were insisting on a $1-plus billion net worth, which you actually show 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 will eliminate investment in Thailand. They've got to pass it. They've got to deal with the fact that I think the Chinese are waiting on [Technical Difficulty] 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 if it ever 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're sadly stepping away from the CEO role, I think you said you're going to stay there for 2 years as a consultant.

I stay until March and then I have a little consulting contract.

Consulting contract beyond that. I mean what would you say are they going to be the priorities for your successor at LVS? What would...

They're no different than we just talked about. There's finding what do you do with the company, it makes a lot of money but has limited growth potential and having to deploy capital. And if you can't 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 '25, it looks to me like the landscape is pretty predictable for anybody, whether it's Patrick or anybody else in this job, it's going to be very much a capital allocation story. You have a wonderful amount of money coming in. And the question is what do you do with it all? And 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 is interesting but after Bangkok, nothing is really out there we can talk about with any kind of certainty. So -- and 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., we'd grow in Asia but I don't see that today. So the big question is, what do you do with a company that makes, let's say, $5-plus billion, has no real need for the money. You buy back shares and you do dividends, I guess. Not very hard to figure out.

Okay. Well, on that simple note, I think we'll wrap it up. Rob, thank you very much for your time.

I appreciate that.