MGM Resorts International (MGM) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, everybody. Leading off at today's conference with the first fireside chat session is MGM Resorts. To my right, to your left, is Corey Sanders, Chief Operating Officer; and then to his right, your left, is Sarah Rogers, who works in the finance area and quarterbacks Investor Relations and works with Andrew Chapman, also in Investor Relations, who's in the front row. Thank you very much for coming, MGM. Thank you guys for attending as well.

Maybe we could start off since it is the first meeting and it's early, and we can kind of ease into these fireside chat questions. Maybe from an operating perspective, Corey, maybe you can give us your top strategic priorities in the domestic portfolio as it relates to have a domestic casino operating portfolio interfaces with some of the other MGM businesses?

Yes. Thanks. Look, I think our top priorities are continuing to look how we can improve our operations, continue to grow cash flow and improve or maintain margins. And in particular, Las Vegas, as you are aware is doing extremely well, but there's still not -- we're still not 100% back there. Conventions probably about 80%, 85% back. The international play has not come back yet. So we think there's opportunities there. We've been working a lot on our commercial business with our commercial group and how we cross-market our properties regional to Las Vegas. We've made some pretty good headway over the last few years there. So continuing to improve on that, I think, is an opportunity for the company. But really, how we're going to focus on top line, at the same time being cautious of potential pullback in what we would do operationally to adjust to that. And we have a pretty decent playbook on that. Our additional focus is, we continue to press on our customer service and, in particular, in our premium customers. We've seen great results there. We've seen result in increased trips with those customers. We think that will help us continue to grow. And then finally, really, the engagement side and the employee engagement component of our business with talent being challenged, with competition coming on board, making sure that we have a culture that really embraces our employees and promotes top talent is really critical to our business.

Great. One of the things that I think we're probably going to hear from others on the Las Vegas Strip at this conference is how lead times and bookings have improved, particularly for midweek convention businesses. As you mentioned, you're not back yet. So it's the opportunity as that business fills in. Where are booking windows and lead times relative to pre-pandemic times? And then how does the convention, I guess, pace look just not for 2023, but beyond in '24 and '25? Because I know as consumers are setting up conferences in Las Vegas, it's getting increasingly difficult to find available space and desired periods to book.

Yes. So our booking pace is back to pre-pandemic levels, where 30 to 90 days out are -- we're starting to see about 50% of our bookings. And in general, the amount of rooms we're booking a week are above pre-pandemic levels and on pace to where we will be able to hit our forecast. The rates that we're booking at continue to be at an elevated rate. We haven't seen any decrease in those areas. With regards to convention, in particular with MGM, we're going to be down a little bit this year. Some of it is strategic. We have made a decision that on weekends, we probably will put less convention business in our buildings. The second part of that is Mandalay Bay is going through a remodel, that facility has needed some love. And so we're going to lose some rooms there. So '23 will be a decent year. We're expecting '24 and '25 to be a better year as we look at our pace and compared with similar periods or about on pace to where we want to be.

And one thing to add there is that the convention room nights that we have this year, in some cases, were booked during the pandemic time line. And so as Corey mentioned, as the out years come out, the pricing will improve as well.

Got it. This is maybe sort of an instinctual answer on your parts and not necessarily something that may be rooted in anything on your books or anything that you could see in bookings. But how do you think about the sustainability of spending trends on the Las Vegas Strip? Whether it's the high-end consumer, the middle and lower end consumer, how the convention meeting planners or bookings? And it's no different than what we're seeing in other parts of the travel economy.

Yes. I think as -- and we study this a lot. The spending has and continues to be pretty consistent. And if you really look at our business, it's not much different from what it was pre-pandemic. It's the mix of customer that's really elevating the revenue in the spend per occupied room. That trend, we feel pretty good about it. We think Las Vegas, in particular, has changed over the last few years. I think Allegiant Stadium, the programming that is going on with us and our competitors with residencies, the Sphere will be a big component also, will continue to increase demand into the city for premium entertainment experience, which we think will continue. We'll be able to maintain the mix that we have -- we're now at.

How do you think about the relative affordability of Las Vegas versus maybe markets that you benchmark yourselves against?

Do you want to?

Sure. So we've done a study with STR to compare to sort of the key markets versus Las Vegas. We still offer a relative value. That gap has tightened a little bit. And some of those drivers that allow us, in our view, to sustain that are things like the continued programming and the improved product and the suite offering that we have. So we're comfortable that we still offer an appropriate relative value and that the city has a lot more to offer these days.

And what I would add is much of the lip that has increased into Harry Reid has come from low-cost carriers. So the cost of transportation to coming to Las Vegas is fairly low compared to other major cities.

You and your peers, whether they're on the Las Vegas Strip or in sort of the regional markets, have done a great job of increasing EBITDA margins relative to pre-pandemic levels and sustaining them during the last year. How do you think about the -- I guess, whether they're fixed or variable OpEx levers in your Las Vegas portfolio and in your regional portfolio?

Yes. I think prior to the pandemic, MGM went through a project called MGM 2020. At that time, we really flattened our cost structure. And that has maintained and we feel pretty good about that from our operating perspective, both regionally and in Las Vegas. We've also learned in the pandemic how to rightsize our operations, how to make sure our restaurants are open when they should be, putting the right entertainment in all of our facilities, not having entertainment just to have entertainment. All of these things have helped us improve. And then the reinvestment in particular, which we've been able to maintain more in our regional operations, I think we feel pretty good about that. And as long as the spend and revenue numbers continue to maintain, maintaining those margins, we feel pretty strong about.

One segment in this market that has not come back nearly as quickly as others is the international segment. Can you talk about what you're seeing on that front? And then maybe you can talk about it in relation to how important it was in 2019 and maybe even more so before 2019 because in 2019, international, particularly Asian business, wasn't that strong.

Yes. That's a very good point. We're probably about -- from the Far East play, which is our biggest driver on the international front, we're probably about 65% to 70% back of where we were. Just to give an idea, during Chinese New Year, we saw a good chunk of that come back. We were probably about 30% before that. It is meaningful to the company. It was about 25% of our table games and then that was in 2019 and probably 5% to 6% of EBITDA. And so we feel like there's -- we're probably about 70% there and hopefully we get some of that back where it started. We were in Singapore for F1, in particular, and we're getting a good sense that the customers are dying to come back to Las Vegas. And whether it be for F1 or Super Bowl or for whatever reason, I would expect that recovery to come back over the next few months.

How does -- we've seen data for domestic airline capacity supporting this market, which has been very strong and 20%, 30% north of where it was in '19. How does the next 3 to 6 months look in terms of international airline capacity support for Las Vegas?

International is about 85% back -- 80% to 85%. I think a good chunk of that is European. We have not seen the Asian business back. But also keep in mind that a lot of our international travel travels through L.A. and San Francisco, and that still quite isn't back yet also. So we haven't had any updates recently, but with China opening up to Hong Kong, I think we'll probably start seeing some more openings in the international market to the West Coast.

Got it. Can you talk about domestically, not just Las Vegas, but the domestic portfolio, how your -- the database has evolved in terms of demographic and then also maybe how you and the industry market to them today versus how it was pre-pandemic, how it was 15 years ago?

Yes. So as the properties opened up in the pandemic, we started seeing younger people and a much higher group under 40 that really has maintained actually. And our 55-plus has actually come back, but the percent of under 40 has increased as a percent of our play, and they're coming for experiences. And so whether it's residencies, whether it's football games. And if you look at the demographics, for example, radar games, they tend to trend younger. I think making sure that we have the right amenities, whether it be clubs or restaurants that attract them, that right price points for these customers, I think, is really important. We've also -- if you look at our slot floors, I think they're a lot more exciting. And they -- we've remodeled those. We've changed the structure. They used to be like rows of machines, now they're pods. You will see a lot more electronic table games, a lot more experiences there. I think that has made a difference in the demographic and them continuing to return.

And does that younger demographic need less marketing dollars or promotions or comps to stimulate spend?

Yes. I think that's a good point. I mean you could do a lot of that socially. You could do a lot of that through what your entertainment practices. The gaming component of it, they are decent trained gamers. So they are going to look for some reinvestment, but nothing significant.

Got it. Corey, how do you work or your team on the domestic gaming portfolio work with the BetMGM guys? And how do you support that joint venture, obviously? And team supports, they're interested in BetMGM on the technology side. You're more on connectivity with the land-based casino and the marketing and rewards program.

Yes. So we're very connected. As you walk through our properties, you'll see BetMGM through all the properties. The presidents are incented to make sure that we have the exposure there. We think there is opportunities in the omnichannel. The casino marketing people are incented to sign up their customers. And on the other end, we have access to all of their customers. So we work very well together in Las Vegas, BetMGM and us, on making sure that a customer has a seamless experience. Our loyalty programs are tied together, although not one for one. There players can earn points and go to our Vegas and regional casinos. So all in all, I think as far as our operations are concerned, we treat BetMGM as a 100% owned and those customers as a 100% owned.

Is the bigger benefit -- is the benefit bigger for Las Vegas or the regional properties in terms of the cross-marketing from BetMGM into MGM Resorts?

I think what we've seen, the biggest opportunity in the omnichannel is on iGaming. And obviously, the iGaming areas such as Borgata or Detroit, we've seen some pretty big benefits there. We've also seen people play in the regions on BetMGM that want to come to Las Vegas. So there's definitely some benefit there also. The crossover to sports isn't quite happened yet, but we think there are opportunities there.

Sarah, maybe we can talk a little bit about Macau. We're about 2 months and 1 week into a recovery there, sort of a staggered recovery. From MGM's perspective, you talked about in your earnings calls, which feels like a thousand months ago and 15 different macro waves for the equity markets. You've been gaining market share there in a relatively short sample size of time. So what do you make of that? And then how do you think about the business coming back, particularly on the premium mass side?

Sure. So our market share in January, which we gave on our earnings call, was 16%. That compares to around 9% pre-pandemic. We do see a mid-teens market share as sustainable. That's driven by a handful of factors. One is the fact that during the closure, we reconfigured our casino floor. We further opened more amenities at MGM Cotai, like The Mansions, gym and Villas. We also earned 200 incremental tables as part of the concession renewal process. So we had 550 tables, we're scaling that up to 750. We're probably 150 in with the remaining 50 to come by the end of this quarter. And we also have a really strong branch network of international marketing offices that are turned on now and targeting customers right to our properties.

Got it. And when you think of -- in 2019, your mix of premium mass as a percentage of total mass, what was that proportion?

It was...

It was meaningfully different on Cotai than on the Peninsula.

We've always been a premium massed shop for the most part, and that's really driven by the scale of our properties versus some of the kind of super large properties on Cotai. So it's really been our bread and butter all along.

Okay. I'll now see if there are any questions from the audience. I can keep on going. Okay, I'll keep on going. Can you talk about your views on capital allocation, Sarah? Obviously, with selling real estate and businesses, you've had inflow and those proceeds have been used to buy back stock in a meaningful way. You have potentially some larger CapEx items coming down the pike in Japan, whenever that might be. And maybe you can talk about that a little bit. And then New York, which is probably more intermediate. Can you talk a little bit about that? So I guess the question to put more succinctly is, how do you think about capital allocation, capital return when you might have sort of a near-term project in New York and something longer term in Japan?

Well, as you know, we have a significant amount of cash on the balance sheet right now. We gave $5.3 billion in cash on our earnings call. When you take out -- we have a bond maturity tomorrow, $1.25 billion. The cash proceeds of the sale of Tunica, which was last month, that gets us to about $4.4 billion. We've said that from a financial policy perspective, we want to have about $1.4 billion in cash plus the revolver availability. We also keep about $500 million in working in cage capital. So net of that, we have about $2.5 billion that is available to allocate at this time. We look at that from a two-pronged approach. One is the further investment in growth opportunities for our business and the priority there is really digital growth. So via LeoVegas and Gary Fritz on our international digital strategy, we'll look to grow our footprint in online gaming internationally. We'll look to improve the product with both product development on the iCasino standpoint and on the sports betting technology platform. And then we'll balance that with the return of capital to shareholders via share buybacks. And as you know, we just added a $2 billion share buyback authorization. We still feel like our stock is attractive here. So then moving on to Japan and New York. New York, we're working on the RFA submission process now. We've talked about a roughly $2 billion spend, of which $500 million will be spent on the license. The timing of that deployment is uncertain. We still have it budgeted to spend the $500 million this year and then I would expect the remainder to sort of straddle '24 and '25 as we work through that product. Then in Japan, timing is uncertain. We've talked about a roughly $2 billion equity contribution from MGM Resorts. And I would say once the license is allocated on our end, that would probably take about 4 years to spend.

Great. On New York, do you and again think the existing operators in downstate New York, do you think you would get a license granted if that third downstate license is still highly competed for and not fully vetted? Or are you kind of -- do you think you guys are tethered to whatever happens with all 3 being approved or granted?

I mean from my understanding, that is an unknown at this time. We're hopeful that we would be giving the authorization to be up and running as soon as possible. We could move slot machines out, put table games in and be a table games taxpayer right away. So that would be a goal of ours.

Got it. MGM Resorts has been a consolidator of gaming assets as well as the developer of gaming assets. Where does M&A fit outside of maybe some of these smaller tuck-in acquisitions for international digital? Is that something that's still an opportunity for you to grow? Or is that sort of more narrow, whether it's because of overconcentration concerns or issues or just not necessarily a focal point?

I do think our priority is clear and that's growing our digital business internationally. In terms of an M&A standpoint, I would never say never. If the right opportunity were to come up, we would, of course, take a look.

And strategically for M&A, is M&A -- I mean all things being equal, has that -- a strategic fit, it has to meet certain financial targets and goals, but is another element of M&A consideration? Maybe it's not, you can answer it. Is it just if we were to have something else that is sort of an operating asset or outside of just being solely an opco, that's appealing. So to potentially increase the percentage of total EBITDA coming from non-opco assets that has attached to it rent with rent escalators. You know what I mean?

Are you saying would you prioritize something that is not an opco for that reason?

Yes.

Again, I think that we're really happy with the portfolio of operating assets that we have right now, but growing that EBITDA internationally digitally provides for that. Beyond that, in the United States or elsewhere, I don't think it's necessarily a target, but certainly something to keep in mind.

Got it. IAC is a major shareholder, has Board presence. They've made a ton of money on their investment in MGM Resorts. What's their long-term MO in MGM Resorts? I'll leave it really broad.

Do you want to take that?

Go for it.

I mean from what I have experienced in terms of our partnership with IAC, they are bringing to the table a great deal of creativity and focusing on how we, as integrated resort and gaming entertainment offers, can bring that to the next generation and sort of the digital future. So it's really been amazing to be a part of and kind of creates a long-term growth and development strategy for us.

Okay. Any additional questions or any questions from the audience? Great. Thank you, Team MGM. I appreciate it.

Thanks.

Thank you.