The University of Macau (UM) has announced that it has revised its forecast for Macau’s 2024 gross domestic product (GDP) growth, and it now estimates that the city’s economy will grow 16.8 percent in real terms this year.
The public university announced the revised forecast in a statement on Friday. The university’s annual forecast on Macau’s economy is carried out by a research team consisting of economists from its Department of Economics. The GDP forecast project is administered by the university’s Centre for Macau Studies (CMS).
The research team initially predicted in December last year that Macau’s economy would grow between 8.3 percent and 21 percent in 2024.
In December last year, according to a UM statement at that time, the research team came up with two possible scenarios with different growth rates of the number of visitor arrivals from the mainland in 2024.
According to December’s statement, the first scenario, a relatively optimistic forecast, assumed that 2024’s possible slowdown in the mainland’s economic growth would have a smaller impact on Macau, in which case the number of visitor arrivals from the mainland would continue to grow at a relatively rapid rate, bringing 2024’s number back to the 2019 level.
The second scenario, a relatively cautious prediction, assumed that the possible slowdown in the mainland’s 2024 economic growth would have a bigger impact on Macau, in which case 2024’s number of visitor arrivals from the mainland would only grow at a “very low” rate, five percent up from 2023, according to December’s statement.
In December last year, the research team forecast 2024’s growth in Macau’s GDP of 21 percent based on its relatively optimistic scenario, while it predicted that the city’s GDP would grow just 8.3 percent based on its relatively cautious scenario at that time.
Yesterday’s UM statement said that the research team now assumes that the possible slowdown in the mainland’s 2024 economic growth will have a smaller impact than previously expected on Macau, in which case the number of visitor arrivals from the mainland this year will return to 90 percent of the pre-pandemic 2019 level.
Based on this new assumption, according to yesterday’s statement, the research team now predicts that Macau’s 2024 GDP will grow 16.8 percent.
This photo taken from Coloane North-East Hiking Trail in January shows casino-hotel resorts in Cotai. – Photo: Tony Wong
