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Razon’s Bloomberry Pressured by Weak Premium Demand and Heavy Debt in First Half

The operator’s two resorts and expanding online business lifted capacity, but weak premium demand, promotional costs, and heavy debt kept first-half earnings under pressure

**MANILA—**Bloomberry Resorts Corp. has more gaming capacity than ever. What it doesn’t yet have is more profit.

The operator of Solaire Resort Entertainment City and the newer Solaire Resort Quezon City reported ₱27.2 billion in net revenue for the first half of 2026, an increase of just 1% from a year earlier. Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization fell 7% to ₱6.4 billion from ₱6.9 billion, while Bloomberry swung to a net loss of ₱470.3 million from a reported ₱1.9 billion profit. 

The numbers expose the challenge Bloomberry faces after a major business expansion. The company now operates two large casinos in Metro Manila and is building out Solaire Online and FUNaloMax. But more gaming floors, hotel rooms and digital channels haven’t yet produced a corresponding increase in consolidated earnings.

Bloomberry’s first-half EBITDA margin declined to approximately 23.5% from 25.6% a year earlier. That contraction matters more than the modest revenue increase: It indicates the expanded operation is producing less operating profit for each peso of revenue. Cash operating expenses rose 3% to ₱20.8 billion, outpacing the 1% increase in net revenue. 

The company’s difficulty isn’t a lack of revenue streams. The new businesses remain too small—or too costly—to offset softness in Bloomberry’s most valuable customer segments.

A Flagship Running Below Full Power

Solaire Entertainment City remains Bloomberry’s principal earnings engine, and its performance remains heavily influenced by VIP and premium-mass players. Those customers place large wagers and can generate high-margin revenue across gaming tables, hotel suites, restaurants and other resort operations.

Demand from those segments remained soft during the first half, management said. The weakness was particularly apparent in the opening quarter, when Entertainment City’s gross gaming revenue fell 18% to about ₱10 billion. VIP GGR declined 29%, mass-table GGR fell 21%, and electronic-gaming-machine revenue slipped 8%. 

The flagship rebounded in the second quarter, reporting an 18% increase in GGR to ₱11.5 billion and a 40% rise in EBITDA to ₱2.4 billion. But the recovery wasn’t entirely driven by more customer wagering. Favorable hold rates—the percentage of bets retained by a casino—played an important role. 

At Entertainment City, VIP rolling-chip volume increased 12% during the second quarter, while VIP GGR jumped 81% because the hold rate rose to 3.61% from 2.23%. Mass-table drop declined 4%, but mass-table GGR increased 8% after the hold rate climbed to 55.3%. Slot-machine coin-in fell 12%, yet electronic-gaming-machine GGR rose 6% because the property retained a larger share of wagers. 

That distinction is important for investors. Higher hold can produce a strong quarter, but casino hold fluctuates. A more durable recovery would require increases in rolling-chip volume, mass-table drop and slot-machine coin-in—not simply better gaming outcomes for the house.

Quezon City Is Growing, but From a Smaller Base

Solaire Quezon City is performing better than some of the consolidated figures suggest. The property generated ₱4.9 billion of GGR in the second quarter, up 9%, while net revenue increased 8% to ₱4.7 billion. EBITDA rose 19% to ₱1.3 billion, demonstrating that Bloomberry’s newer resort is making a meaningful operating contribution.

Still, Quezon City isn’t yet large enough to compensate fully for weakness at Entertainment City. Its second-quarter GGR was less than half the flagship’s ₱11.5 billion. Some measures of underlying demand were also mixed: mass-table drop declined 23%, though mass-table GGR fell only 5% because the hold rate improved to 33% from 26.7%. Electronic-gaming-machine coin-in grew 7%, providing a more encouraging sign of volume growth. 

The second property may also shift some existing Solaire customers within Metro Manila rather than creating entirely new wagering activity. Bloomberry doesn’t disclose how much business at Quezon City is incremental and how much might otherwise have gone to Entertainment City. That possible cannibalization means the revenues of two casinos can’t simply be added together and assumed to represent new group demand.

Online Gaming Is Still a Work in Progress

Bloomberry’s digital operation hasn’t yet become the third earnings engine investors might have expected.

FUNaloMax was commercially launched on the company’s proprietary platform only recently, and management said Solaire Online would migrate to the same platform in the coming weeks. As a result, the digital strategy wasn’t operating at its intended scale throughout the first half. 

Online gaming also carries costs that can limit its near-term contribution. Operators must spend on technology, software maintenance, advertising, promotions, payment processing and customer acquisition. Some digital betting may replace activity that would otherwise take place in a physical casino, allowing Bloomberry to retain the customer without generating fully incremental group revenue.

Evidence of heavier customer incentives appears in Bloomberry’s contra-revenue. In the second quarter, contra-revenue rose 23% to ₱3.7 billion and represented 23% of consolidated GGR, up from 21% a year earlier. Those deductions include benefits and promotional allowances used to attract and retain casino customers, and their increase reduced the amount of gross gaming revenue converted into reported net revenue. 

Debt Raises the Earnings Threshold

Bloomberry’s larger operation also carries a substantial financing burden. At June 30, the company had ₱104.8 billion of long-term debt, compared with ₱31.4 billion in cash and ₱59 billion in equity attributable to the parent. That translates into gross debt of roughly 1.8 times equity and net debt of about ₱73.4 billion.

Interest expense totaled ₱3.6 billion in the first half—about 56% of EBITDA—giving Bloomberry EBITDA interest coverage of roughly 1.8 times. Previous refinancing transactions saved the company ₱409.5 million in first-half interest expense, but the remaining charge still consumes a large portion of operating earnings before depreciation, taxes and capital spending. 

The company’s ₱31.4 billion cash balance provides a meaningful liquidity cushion, and both Philippine properties are generating positive EBITDA. Even so, leverage leaves Bloomberry with less tolerance for prolonged weakness in premium gaming or an unfavorable swing in casino hold. At the first-half EBITDA run rate, annualized net debt would equal roughly 5.7 times EBITDA—a high level that makes sustained earnings growth and eventual debt reduction especially important.

A Better Quarter, but Not Yet a Turnaround

Bloomberry’s second quarter supplied grounds for cautious optimism. Consolidated GGR increased 15%, net revenue rose 11%, and EBITDA advanced 35% to ₱3.4 billion. The quarterly net loss narrowed to ₱345.3 million from ₱1.4 billion a year earlier, while cash operating expenses increased a relatively contained 5%.

The first-half year-over-year net-income comparison also looks worse than the underlying change because the 2025 period included a ₱2.9 billion noncash gain from refinancing. The 2026 period included a smaller ₱403 million gain from the sale of the Jeju Sun gaming license. Removing those unusual gains suggests the underlying result improved modestly, though Bloomberry still hasn’t restored recurring profitability.

For now, Bloomberry’s results tell a straightforward story: The company has successfully built additional capacity, but demand hasn’t expanded quickly enough to fill it at attractive margins. Quezon City is growing, digital gaming is still scaling, and Entertainment City’s premium segments remain subdued. Meanwhile, operating expenses, promotions, depreciation and interest costs continue to absorb much of what the resorts generate.

The test for the second half won’t simply be whether revenue rises. It will be whether wagering volumes—not favorable hold alone—improve; whether EBITDA grows faster than revenue; whether digital gaming contributes incremental profit rather than just another cost center; and whether stronger cash generation begins to reduce Bloomberry’s leverage.

Until those things happen, Bloomberry will remain a larger casino company without yet being a more profitable one. 

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Disclaimer: This is for informational purposes and is not investment advice. Figures are taken from company disclosures and exchange data; valuation ratios include the author’s calculations based on cited inputs. 

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