Stick a fork in the Las Vegas Tower (aka Crown Las Vegas). It's done. Finito. Not gonna happen. Or, as one reader puts it, the developers "pulled the plug on the circumcised version of Crown Las Vegas" (Clark County having sheared 824 feet from the proposed height of a tower whose design has also been likened to a giant vibrator).

OK, so the project was always more freakishly entertaining than plausible (but you should have heard the excited calls I got from would-be investors back when it was announced). And the handwriting has been on the wall since the first week of March, when several of project co-owner James Packer's companies got hammered.

By that point, Packer and LV Tower's proud papa, Christopher Milam, had dropped a cool $61.2 million (soon to become $63.5 million) in deposits and option payments on the ex-Wet 'n Wild site. Of that amount, $16.2 million was neither refundable nor applicable to the $450 million purchase price. (It must be nice to be able to just throw $16.2 million away like a used Kleenex.)

Milam confirmed yesterday that the 27 acres is on the market again. Goldman Sachs and CB Richard Ellis are handling the sale. Sure, he and Packer can buy it for a new, improved price of $475 million if they act by the end of June. But if landowner Archon Corp. has lost patience with the duo, one can't really blame it.

Milam is even talking about "selling the land for the right price." Now there's a neat trick: Selling land that you don't yet own. He also floats the notion of selling off additional percentages of the project, which already has two JV partners. If he's not careful, Milam's going to start sounding like Max Bialystock.

As for Packer, the Sydney Morning Herald runs the numbers and concludes it may be "a blessing in disguise" for Packer, who "spent and borrowed big at the top of the market last year" and may be putting on the brakes. Not to mention all that debt he has to service.

But wait -- Packer got 37.5% of the Las Vegas Tower project for a mere $22.5 million. (Milam must have been having some real cash-flow problems at the time.) And he owns almost a fifth of the neighboring Fontainebleau project, also gained for a comparative pittance. So is the point where he flips to whole kit-n-caboodle to Fontainebleau's majority owners, or does he have a different exit strategy in mind?

A plus for Packer. Just when the Aussie heir could use some good news, his gorgeous Crown Macau is named the busiest casino in Macao by Credit Suisse. By offering a 1.35% commission on table play to junket organizer A-Max, Crown Macau more than tripled its betting volume, taking big bites out of Galaxy Entertainment, Las Vegas Sands and Stanley Ho.

According to Credit Suisse's estimates, market share in Macao has changed from November to February as follows:

Crown Macau: 5.7% / 18.1% (+310%)

Galaxy (multiple casinos): 14.3% / 10.9% (-24%)

Venetian Macao: 28% / 22% (-21%)

Stanley Ho/SJM (innumerable casinos): 37% / 24% (-35%)

Those figures, as reported, also mean that Sands Macao and Wynn Resorts had 15% of the market share in November, and that between those two rivals and MGM Mirage/Pansy Ho, that share has grown to 25%. If Packer and partner Lawrence Ho have accomplished this by raising commission rates, expect to hear howls of high dudgeon from some of their competitors soon: Letting the market decide? How dare they! What sauce, I say!

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