No need for further spending cuts in Macau says official

Sunday 13th of September 2015

Macau’s Secretary for Economy and Finance said the government is financially stable and sees no need to launch more measures to control expenditure.

In a statement from the government’s information Bureau, Lionel Leong said the government is in no financial difficulty as there is more than MOP10 billion ($1.2 billion) of accumulated reserves according to the amended budget for the fiscal year 2015, which was submitted to the Legislative Assembly in March.

The budget required the administration to launch stricter financial measures when gaming revenue fell to a monthly average of MOP20 billion patacas. Gaming revenue fell 35.5 percent last month to MOP18.62 billion.

Leong said Macao might experience short-term uncertainty due to the external financial environment, and stressed that the government would closely monitor the situation from September to December and would consider introducing measures to tighten the use of public funds only when there was no surplus generated.

Since September, the government launched retrenchment measures to control public expenditure, including a plan to save MOP1.4 billion from government departments.

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