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About 40% of the rooms in the territory's three-to-five-star hotels have been fully booked as at Friday, three days before China's week-long holiday starts, according to online booking websites including Agoda.com and Expedia. That compares with 80% at roughly the same time last year. Hotels are charging about double or triple their usual prices, a lower premium than 2017 when some suites were listed at five times the typical rate. Macao has seen softening growth in gaming revenue since the second quarter. Analysts have cut their estimates for this year and 2019, as a weakening yuan, China's economic slowdown and escalating trade tensions with the US threaten to derail a two-year rebound in Macao. Gaming revenue forecasts for September were cut in half to 6.5%, according to a survey of seven analysts by Bloomberg News. If the forecast bears out, it would be the first month since February that gaming growth slowed to single digits. Analysts forecast October will follow the weakening trend with growth of 5%.
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