For the longest time, one of America’s largest shopping-mall developers, Taubman Centers, wasn’t as enthused about stampeding into the new casino boomtown of Macau, thinking the area was being overly bombarded with development. But that was then. As of last month, Taubman broke ground in a joint-venutre casino resort project, which will include 750,000 sq. ft. of retail space, according to Business Week.

The article reveals that Morgan Parker, president of Taubman Asia Limited, “dismisses a common argument that the Chinese gamblers who are filling up the casinos are only interested in betting and won’t shop. He said they aren’t hitting the malls now because there are no quality shopping centers in Macau now.”

Macau is the next gambling mecca of the world. This is the new area where “what happens here stays here.” Sure, blame me for trying to beat a dead horse, but this story is just too hot to ignore every day. I just don’t want you to miss out on the gangbuster Vegas-type growth that the region will see over the next few years.

The other day, I told you about Virgin’s possible move to the Macau region. Today, Casino City Times reports, “Macau offers the largest international expansion opportunity, with the potential for 50,000 new slot machines by 2010. With the $2.4 billion Venetian Macau, the $1 billion MGM Grand Macau and an expansion to the $1.2 billion Wynn Macau all expected to open by the end of the year, slot makers are racing to fill orders for games that will appeal to Chinese gamblers.”

Even better for the region, the unemployment rate at the close of 2006 was 3.5% as compared to the 4% posted for 2005, according to Macau’s Statistics and Census Bureau. Most of that improvement is thanks to the large numbers of jobs now available in gaming, hotel and restaurant sectors, which are strengthened by substantial visitor growth to the region.

According to an FT.com story linked to by DrudgeReport.com, “[Macau] surpassed the Las Vegas Strip to become the world’s biggest gambling center in 2006, measured by total gambling revenue, according to industry analysts and government figures released today. In the eight years since [Macau], a former Portuguese colony on the coast near Hong Kong, was returned to Chinese control in 1999, it has experienced a huge boom in casino investment, and millions of mainland Chinese have been flooding into the tiny island territory to gamble. As a result, gambling revenue soared by 22 percent in 2006, reaching $6.95 billion, according to figures released by the local administration today.”

Better still, Macau, which just dethroned Las Vegas as the world’s gambling capital, could double its revenue to $14 billion by the time 2010 rolls around. That’s huge. This is an ever-expanding region with 1.3 million people living within a three-hour flight of Macau and another 100 million people living within a radius of a three-hour drive, according to Macau Business News.

What does that mean for investors? Buy any company that’ll be involved in Macau casino growth.

One company to keep an eye on is Transact Technologies (TACT: NASDAQ), which supplies printers used in slot machines and video lottery terminals that print tickets instead of issuing coins at casinos, racetracks, as well as selling printers using impact-printing technology for use mainly in video lottery terminals and other gaming devices.

The company doesn’t sound sexy at all until you find out that it just inked a partnership with Wynn Casinos. Wynn Macau is the first casino to open with 100% TransAct-supplied printers, according to reports.

This is just one of five Macau-related companies that you must own. We have detailed the Macau boom and these trades in our Special Report, “The Most Lucrative City in the World” in the Special Reports section of the Early Alert Trader site. Learn more about the boom here…

Take care,
Ian Cooper
February 6, 2007

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