more like a mistatement. it's tracking for an opening lower than either Force Awakens or Last Jedi, by a considerable amount. 175-200 million domestic, which would be anywhere from 50-75 million less than TFA or 20-50 million less than Last Jedi.
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/h...e-skywalker-tracking-175m-200m-us-bow-1258240
that article is from October.
I think there's a chance it gets a last movie bounce over Last Jedi, but on the other hand, Last Jedi ended up being very divisive amongst Star Wars geeks and I think the other movies had the main draw of being a Han Solo Return, then a Luke return and this was supposed to the movie that really focussed on Leia, but a) as great as Leia was, she just wasn't as huge in pop culture as Luke and Han and b) she unfortunately died before filming and it's widely known that while she'll be in the movie, her scenes will be cobbled together from outtakes and cut scenes from the other movies and she won't be
that big of a part in it... which is pretty apparent as the marketing pretty much has absolutely nothing of Leia. I'm not sure people are going to be rushing to the cinema en masse to see the "saga end" with a bunch of characters that they aren't completely in love with.
but we'll see.