MACAU — The baccarat tables at the Venetian's Red Dragon section still teem each night with hundreds of the Chinese players who've fueled Macau's breathtaking shot to the top of the gambling world.

But as gamblers place bets of 500 patacas ($65) and more inside the popular Las Vegas Sands Corp. casino — cheering and bellowing with each flip of a hand — construction cranes stand idle atop hulking steel shells of three half-finished hotels across the street.

The hot streak that turned Macau into the world's gambling capital is cooling as global economic and financial woes delay new projects, cut into incomes and hurt tourism. Tightened travel restrictions on mainland Chinese tourists, the engine behind Macau's growth, also are taking a toll, and revenue growth is slowing for the first time in years.

"Without a doubt, the incredible heat that we've seen in the market before is coming off," said Anthony Lawrence, publisher of the territory's Destination Macau magazine.

Las Vegas Sands suspended work last week on the hotel towers as part of its effort to comply with debt agreements backed by its Las Vegas properties. And it was a drop in Sands' Las Vegas earnings that partly triggered the construction halts. But the troubles aren't unique to Sands or to Las Vegas, where revenues are down across the board.

In Macau, Galaxy Entertainment Group Ltd. likely won't open its entire 2,500-room Cotai Mega Resort in Macau on time next year, some analysts say, because of a possible funding gap. And a $2.5 billion joint-venture gambling resort called Macau Studio City, near Sands' two suspended sites on a stretch of reclaimed land known as the Cotai Strip, could face delays as well.

Macau, the only place in China where gambling is legal, boomed after the government broke up a local company's monopoly six years ago and started welcoming U.S. gambling powerhouses like Sands, Wynn Resorts Ltd. and MGM Mirage Inc.

As the operators built one glitzy casino-resort after another, gamblers showed up by the millions — more than half of them from mainland China — and profits surged. By 2006, this tiny, former Portuguese colony less than one-sixth the size of Washington, D.C., surpassed Las Vegas as the world's most lucrative gambling center.

From 2003 to 2007, Macau gambling revenue nearly tripled to 83 billion patacas, or $10.3 billion. And this year it's on track to top $13 billion — more than double the take in Las Vegas.

But signs of a slowdown are emerging. While an average of five casinos sprouted annually between 2004 and this year, 2009 may see only one major opening, from Melco Crown Entertainment Ltd.

Casino revenue, while well ahead of last year, slipped 10 percent in the third quarter from the previous three months, the second straight quarter-to-quarter decline. Macau's leader says average monthly revenues could drop in 2009 to 7 billion patacas (about $893 million) compared with more than 9 billion ($1.5 billion) monthly through September this year.

Fresh problems surfaced last week when Sands, the city's leading casino operator by market share, indefinitely halted construction at its Macau projects — including Shangri-La, Traders and Sheraton hotels as well as casinos — throwing as many as 11,000 out of people out of work. Sands officials say they're in talks with banks about new financing, but it's unclear how long that will take or when construction might resume.

Slackening economic growth in and around China is at least partly to blame for slowing revenue growth in Macau. The bigger reason for a drop-off that large may be tightening visa rules that, among other things, now limit to once every three months the times Guangdong residents can go to Macau. Mainland tourists are vital, accounting for more than half of Macau's revenues. While the changes might be temporary, the impact already is evident. Tourist arrivals in September grew by a 2 percent compared with the same period last year; by comparison, they grew nearly 30 percent in September last year from 2006. Never fully explained by China's central government, the restrictions are seen as an attempt to control Macau's galloping growth.