SkyCity downgrades 2025 earnings forecast

SkyCity has downgraded its 2025 earnings forecast. Photo / Jason Oxenham

SkyCity Entertainment Group has downgraded its full year 2025 earnings guidance due to worsening market conditions.

The casino operator said that since its first half update on February 20, market conditions had continued to deteriorate.

The company now expects June year earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation to fall to about 4% below the bottom of the current guidance range of $225 million to $245m.

“Visitation continues to hold steady across all our precincts,” SkyCity said.

“However, spend per visit across the group has continued to fall, making forecasting difficult.

“Auckland has seen reduced spend per visit across both its hospitality and gaming businesses, whilst Hamilton and Queenstown casinos have continued to perform broadly in line with group expectations,” the company said.

In Adelaide, performance had been impacted by lower visitation and lower spend by VIP gaming customers due to an uplift in its anti-money laundering and its harm minimisation programme.

This was despite overall EGM [electronic gambling machine] turnover in South Australia growing year-over-year.

Chief executive officer, Jason Walbridge, said: “The difficult market conditions that businesses like ours - which are reliant on discretionary consumer spending - are experiencing continue to have a significant impact on both our revenue and earnings.

“We continue to be pleased with the levels of visitation we are seeing across our precincts and are adjusting our underlying cost base where appropriate, in response to the lower revenue levels we are currently experiencing.”

Walbridge said SkyCity remained optimistic that as consumer confidence returns and spend began to lift, the company was well-placed to maximise the opportunities, such as the NZ International Convention Centre opening in February 2026.

SkyCity’s shares last traded at $1.15, having dropped by 32.3% over the last 12 months.

Jamie Gray is an Auckland-based journalist, covering the financial markets, the primary sector and energy. He joined the Herald in 2011.