Wynn Resorts Ltd Q2 FY2025 Earnings Call

Welcome to the Wynn Resort's second quarter 2025 earnings call. All participants are in a listen-only mode until the question-and-answer session of today's conference. To ask a question, press star 1 on your touchtone phone. Record your name and I will introduce you. Please limit yourself to one question and one follow-up question. This call is being recorded. If you have any objections, you may disconnect at this time. I will now turn the line over to Julie Cameron Doe, Chief Financial Officer. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Operator, and good afternoon, everyone. On the call with me today are Craig Billings and Brian Gilbrunt in Las Vegas. Also on the line are Jenny Holliday, Linda Chen, and Frederick Lubisuto. Please note that we published a presentation to provide more color on the company and recent performance ahead of this call. You can find the presentation on our Investor Relations website. I want to remind you that we may make forward-looking statements under Safe Harbor Federal Securities laws, and those statements may or may not come true. I will now turn the call over to Craig Billings.

Good afternoon. I'm incredibly proud of our quarter record of 2% year-over-year to nearly $235 million. Adjusting for hold, that number would have been even higher at $246 million. It was healthy throughout the quarter with impressive increases in both drop and handle, driving a 14.5%, a reflection of our ability to continue to take gaming market share. Pleased to grow RevCar, continued strength in retail. More recently, the business in July saw continued momentum in the casino with drop and handle both up versus July 2024 and strong retail sales. In the hotel in July, we had a week rate over occupancy, consistent with our premium positioning, and made operational adjustments. While macro did $266 million in VIP normalized EBITDA, with unfavorable VIP hold costing us nearly $13 million. Volumes were up nicely in the quarter, with mass drop up $3 million. The premium segment continues to lead the market forward in Macau. To further enhance our premium positioning, we have recently initiated two key capital projects. an expansion of the Chairman's Club gaming area at Wynn Palace, and a refresh of our Wynn Tower rooms at Wynn Macau. While we expect some minor disruption toward the end of the year from these projects, once they are complete, we expect they will further elevate our offerings at both properties. Wynn Almarjon Island continues to progress rapidly. We are pouring the 61st floor and on track to top out the tower later this year. We've also finalized several important food and beverage partnerships and agreed to key terms with a number of high-profile retail tenants. We remain on track for our targeted opening date and continue to believe it is the most cooperating and what many analysts are predicting will be a five future is bright. And to that end, we...

Thank you, Craig. At Wynn Las Vegas, we generated $234.8 million in adjusted property EBITDA on $638.6 million of operating revenue during the quarter, delivering an EBITDA margin of 36.8%. Low hold negatively impacted EBITDA in the quarter by $11.4 million. OPEX excluding gaming tax per day was $4.2 million in the quarter, up 1% compared to the prior year due to normal wage inflation from our union and non-union areas. As Craig mentioned earlier, we're pleased to be resuming our Encore Tower remodel with construction set to begin in spring 2026 with an estimated spend of $330 million, which we expect to take about a year to complete. Turning to Boston, we generated adjusted property EBITDA of $63.9 million on revenue of $215.7 million with an EBITDA margin of 29.6%. Casino revenues grew 5.2% year over year, and we maintained our discipline on the cost side with OPEX per day of $1.15 million, flat to Q2 2024, despite continued labor cost pressures in that market. The Boston team has continued to do a great job of mitigating union-related payroll increases with cost efficiencies in areas of the business that do not impact the guest experience. Our Macau operations delivered adjusted property EBITDA of $253.7 million in the quarter on $883.5 million of operating revenue, resulting in an EBITDA margin of 28.7%. Lower than normal VIP hold impacted EBITDA by a little under $13 million in the quarter. OPEX, excluding gaming tax, was approximately $2.66 million per day in Q2, up 4.5% year-on-year, with the increase driven primarily by the gourmet pavilion and normal course cost-of-living increases. The team has done a great job in staying disciplined on costs, and we remain well-positioned to drive strong operating leverage as the market continues to grow over time. In terms of CAPEX in Macau, as Craig mentioned, we've initiated two projects, an expansion of the Chairman's Club gaming area at Wynn Palace and a refresh of our Wynn Tower rooms at Wynn Macau. And together with our other ongoing CapEx projects, we expect to spend a total of $200 to $250 million in total for 2025. Moving on to the balance sheet, our liquidity position remains very strong with global cash and revolver availability of $3.6 billion as of June This was comprised of $1.8 billion of total cash and available liquidity in Macau and a little over $1.7 billion in the U.S. Subsequent to quarter end, we announced an upsize of our credit facility in Macau, where we added $1 billion of additional under-on revolver capacity from a number of new lenders, providing significant additional liquidity and flexibility to our balance sheet and indicating the strong confidence and support of our lenders in the market. The combination of strong performance in each of our markets globally, with our properties generating just over $2.2 billion of LTM adjusted property EBITDA, together with our robust cash position, creates a very healthy, consolidated net leverage ratio of just under 4.4 times. Our strong free cash flow and liquidity profile also allows us to continue returning capital to shareholders in both Macau and the U.S. To that end, Win Macau recently increased its final dividend for 2024 to approximately $125 million, which was paid in the second quarter. In addition, the Win Resorts Board has approved a cash dividend of $0.25 per share, payable on August 29, 2025, to stockholders of record as of August 18. During the quarter, we repurchased 2 million shares for approximately $158 million. These share buybacks, together with our recurring dividend, highlight our focus on and continued commitment to prudently returning capital to shareholders. In terms of CapEx, we spent approximately $165 million in the quarter, primarily related to the Fairway Villa Renovations and F&B Enhancements in Las Vegas, concession-related CapEx in Macau, and normal course maintenance across the business. In addition to that figure, we contributed $58.2 million of equity to the Wenna Marjan Island project during the quarter, bringing our total equity contribution to date to $741.1 million. During the quarter, we continued drawing on the Marjan construction loan with a drawn amount to date of $395 million. We estimate our remaining 40% pro rata share of the required equity is approximately $600 to $675 million. With that, we will now open up the call to Q&A.

Thank you. To ask a question, press star 1 on your touchtone phone. Unmute your phone, record your name clearly after the prompt, and I will introduce you for your question. Please limit yourself to one question and one follow-up question. To withdraw your question, you may press star, too. Our first question comes from Dan Poulter with J.P. Morgan. You may go ahead, sir.

Hey, good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for taking my questions. First, I wanted to touch on Las Vegas. It was very strong in the quarter, clearly outperforming the market by a wide range. How much of this outperformance do you attribute to positioning at the high end of the market, which is where your property sits versus some of the operational pivots that you've made? And, you know, looking ahead, what are your expectations for third quarter and fourth quarter, just given some of the comments that we've heard thus far this earnings season?

Sure, thanks. I'll start and then I'll ask you. You know, it's a lot of things. I mean, certainly being at the luxury end of the market helps. Resilient three-plus years, really, doing everything we can to make sure that.

Yeah, the team continues to accelerate. Booking pace continues to look actually quite good. July, we saw some of the best booking. It's really a combination of the sales team, the casino marketing team, and everybody coming together to really focus on the revenue side. And then the ops team, we have the right amount of staff for the right

amount of business. And then just to follow up on Macau, certainly the market seems to have

inflected here the last couple of months. Industry GDR has accelerated and it seems like you've participate in that. And what do you attribute that inflection to? Is that, are you seeing a difference in terms of the actual fundamentals, the customers that are coming to spend per customer, or is it a function of the entertainment or calendar? Yeah, again, kind of similar to my

response on your biggest question, it's a little bit of everything. Certainly entertainment and the entertainment that's been in the market has played a role, but even subsequent to with those concerts, which happened, we've seen strength in the market in July. And so I quoted our EBITDA run rate in July, and we're incredibly proud of that. And, you know, we can't, we tend to not.

Thanks so much.

Thank you. Our next caller is Steve Pozella with Deutsche Bank. Your line is open, sir.

Hey, good afternoon, everybody, and thank you for taking our questions. Does the big, beautiful bill make you think any differently at all about some of the potential domestic CapEx projects that you've talked about in the past in both Vegas and, I guess, in Boston?

Sure.

I mean, there are certainly some corporate tax provisions in the bill that will benefit us, you know, when you think about the depreciation side of things and interest deductibility. But that's really, for us, it's going to be primarily in 2028 and beyond. So nothing really immediate that would cause us to change course with how we're approaching our CapEx programs.

Okay, thank you. And then are you just able to comment on 4Q, Las Vegas group pace, and any early commentary on expectations for Formula One this year now that we're year three, I believe? Any lessons learned from the past two years?

as well as very bullish on where we are much improved over last year. We're seeing that through corporate bookings and early corporate bookings, and we're maintaining the rates unlike.

Okay, appreciate it.

Thank you. Our next caller is Lizzie Dove with Goldman Sachs.

Hi there. Thanks for taking the question. Sticking with Vegas, I wonder if you could go a bit deeper in terms of the consumer pulse check. Like, you know, we've heard there's been mixed trends between domestic versus international inbound. And then once people are in the hotels, are they spending in the same way? What are you seeing on the food and beverage and the kind of incremental side of things? We'd just love to know if there's kind of been differences there.

Happy to talk about that. We sit in a unique position. We're not the best, you know, Las Vegas. We've never been in a market where we see how...

And then just switching to Will, Wynne Almarjan, I'm curious, you know, As we get closer to the Investor Day, closer to the launch, you know, not too far from now, I mean, how do you think about ways that you can set yourselves up for that, you know, early 2027 launch for success? I saw you, you know, hired new team members. You've got the Win Mayfair acquisition. But what are the kind of things and building blocks you can put into place to put you in the best position for when that eventually opens?

Yeah, it's a great question. I'll be honest. Most of that is not transparent to you all. But it's much like any integrated group. Thank you.

Thank you. Our next caller is Stephen Grambling with Morgan Stanley. Your line is open.

Hey, thanks. Just wanted to follow up a bit on expenses. First on Vegas, looks like you were able to keep costs relatively contained in the very low single digits. Curious if there was any timing of costs in there or other puts and takes to think about, or is this just a proof point for managing the expense structure? and effectively the same question around corporate expenses, which I think we're down year over year.

Thanks, Stephen. Yeah, I'll take that. Really, on the expense side, we just do, you know, we continue to manage it very diligently and judiciously. You know, the teams across the globe really focus on that. They focus on, you know, making sure they're looking at what's coming up and making sure we're staffed appropriately, and we have a great, you know, flexible approach to that so we're able to dial things up and dial things down in line with volume. And we take it very seriously and we manage to that, and I think we always comment on the fact that we do it in a way that doesn't impact the guest experience. But it is a focus for us. On the corporate expense side, you know, nothing unusual going through there other than we did have our 20th anniversary in the quarter. in the quarter, so you'll see there were some costs involved with that celebration from an event perspective, but also on the equity side as well. There were some one-off grants associated with that to our day-one employees.

And I would just add that Brian Goldbrand's just through a case. These guys work really hard, I mean, day by day.

Makes sense. That's helpful. And then one follow-up on Macau. Now, just given the strength of the market, you did mention it's all about getting the right person in the seat in Vegas. I imagine the same is fairly true in Macau. Maybe you can elaborate on who is coming into the market in Macau. Is it skewed to specific submarkets within China versus Hong Kong? Is it new customers versus returning younger or otherwise?

Yeah, I think we've mentioned on previous calls that we've seen a very large influx post-COVID, post-reopening of new customers. So certainly there's been a lot of high quality. I think the mix of customers has been pretty consistent with what we've seen since the market re-opened.

Great. Thanks so much.

Thank you. Our next caller is David Katz with Jefferies. Your line is open.

Hi, afternoon. Thanks for taking my question. I wanted to go back to Macau. You know, one of the items that comes up in conversations and checks, et cetera, is, you know, promotions and credit. I'd love to get your sort of perspective on what's happening in the market and how, you know, you deal with that. And second, you know, entertainment seems to be a big driver there. I'd love to get a sense for, again, what your perspective is and what your participation is in any of that going forward.

Sure. On the reinvestment side, we must modulate our reinvestment, depending upon what goals.

If I can follow that up, when is that supposed to be completed, active, et cetera?

Understood.

Thank you. John DeCurie with CBRE. Your line is open.

Hi. Thank you for taking my questions. Maybe one on Vegas to start. A little nuanced, but maybe trying for a little additional color. So, Craig, when you spoke to the midweek, like everyone else, you know, being a little softer on occupancy, but your holding rate, what have you seen on property spend, you know, for the customers that are still coming in? Has that been same, you know, up, down? You know, is that holding up and just fewer people are coming in midweek? How would you characterize that?

Yeah, on property spend is, and we continue to sell so a nice indicator and spend it here.

it went. Understood. Thanks, Brian. Maybe one more big picture. Looks like Thailand has quieted down for the time being. And Craig, not that your plate isn't plenty full already, but is there anything else around that you guys are kicking the tires on or that looks interesting at the moment as it relates to new markets or new developments other than the kind of projects you've outlined, reinvesting in Las Vegas and Macau and obviously RAC? Yeah, thanks, John.

So our priority –

Thanks, Craig.

Our next caller is Steve Wozinski with Stiefel. You may go ahead, sir.

Hey, guys. Good afternoon. Just one question from me. All my others have been asked and answered. So, Craig, if we go back to the UAE and we think about the EBITDA range that you guys have out there today, which I think is 265 to 460, somewhere around there. And obviously every day you're learning more and more about the market, what type of player will eventually come to that market. As you sit here today and think about some of the assumptions, I mean, going back to your October Investor Day, as you kind of think about some of those assumptions that you're using to come up with that EBITDA range, do you feel like some of those assumptions might end up being somewhat conservative? And I guess this is another way of me asking, do you see upside to that range based on your current day-to-day learnings about the market?

Yes, sure. and thank you for the question, look a bit more near term. So we're not really incentivized. We did so assume.

Thanks, Greg. Thanks for the color. Appreciate it.

Thank you. Our next caller is Robin Farley with UBS.

Thanks. Yeah, I have a question about the UAE project, and you kind of answered half of it already just in that last question. You know, you have a competitor that's building a resort in the UAE without gaming approved yet. So the question was going to be, you anticipate being the only one by the time you open in 2027 which it sounds like you anticipate being the only one but I guess what's your expectation for how long before another project that's you know already under construction

might you know that you might have that competition thanks yeah we do it thank

you very helpful operator the next question will be our last one please

thank you then shaken with the zuho you may go ahead sir hey how's it going

Thanks for taking my question. Another question on UA, maybe similar to Lizzie's question, but maybe slightly more specific. So you've talked about the different player cohorts in the past. Maybe talk about your current plan to build the pipeline going into this opening. It's obviously been a while since there's been a large opening in a new market. Obviously you have the casino you purchased in London, but is there a social media campaign? Are you relying on existing international players? would just love any color on the tactical kind of behind-the-scenes decision-making or thought process.

This is your second quarter with a great question, so thank you. Yeah, we're doing a lot. So it goes into London and goes.

Operator, apologies. There is one more questioner out there, I believe. Sean Kelly would like to ask a question.

Thank you. One moment. And he is actually not responding, so yes.

Okay. Well, then, thank you, operator, and thank you, everyone, for joining us for the Wynn Resorts Q2 earnings call. We look forward to talking to you again in a few months.