NBA to host pre-season games in Macau from 2025


Deal marks NBA's go back to China after 2019 debate


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Macau gambling establishments aiming to increase non-gaming profits


(Rewrites to include context that deal marks NBA's go back to China)


By Farah Master


HONG KONG, Dec 6 (Reuters) - The National Basketball Association (NBA) has actually signed a multiyear offer to play pre-season games in Macau from 2025, marking the league's go back to the Chinese market after a years-long lack that followed controversy over the 2019 Hong Kong demonstrations.


Local media priced quote NBA Deputy Commissioner Mark Tatum as saying the NBA would host 2 pre-season video games every year for the next 5 years at casino operator Sands China's Venetian arena in Macau, a special administrative area of China. The very first video games, scheduled for October of next year, will pit the Brooklyn Nets versus the Phoenix Suns.


A source acquainted with the matter confirmed the local media reports of the deal. The NBA did not instantly react to a demand for comment.


Although China has recently hosted NBA legends celeb video games, including one scheduled for Saturday at the Venetian residential or commercial property, the pre-season deal will mark a return of routinely set up NBA play to China.


The NBA's lack followed a firestorm of controversy around comments five years back by the Houston Rockets' then-General Manager Daryl Morey, who posted a message on social media in assistance of anti-government demonstrations in Hong Kong.


Beijing suspended the broadcast of NBA games following that occurrence, triggering corporate sponsors to flee and the league to suffer what it described at the time as significant financial consequences. Pre-season NBA games in China were also ditched.


In February, Joe Tsai, owner of the Brooklyn Nets basketball team and chairman of Chinese tech company Alibaba, said the occurrence was water under the bridge which the NBA would love to bring games back to China and Macau.


Macau is the only place in China where residents have the ability to lawfully gamble in gambling establishments.


Its federal government and Beijing have been advising the 6 certified casinos - Wynn Macau, Sands China, SJM Holdings, Galaxy Entertainment, Melco and MGM China - to increase their percentage of revenue from non-gaming.


Macau's economy is heavily dependent on the gambling establishment market, which contributes around 80% of regional tax earnings.


In 2015, Macau's government presented its first blueprint centred on a method where tourism and leisure are the primary pillars, supported by emerging industries such as conventional Chinese medicine, health, financial services and technology, along with conventions, exhibits, trade, culture and sports.


It goes for non-gaming industries to represent around 60% of Macau's GDP by 2028 versus 50% pre-pandemic in 2019.


(Reporting by Farah Master; Additional reporting by Brenda Goh; Editing by Shri Navaratnam, Nicholas Yong and Edmund Klamann)