Gaming industry bears are going to latch onto a 4% drop in Maryland gambling earnings as evidence of an impending recession. Thankfully, J.P. Morgan analyst Joseph Greff puts it in context by pointing out that the $174 million haul is 17% higher than July 2019, itself a high-water mark at the time. The Free State moves closer to a duopoly, with MGM National Harbor (41%) and Maryland Live (36%) capturing more than three-fourths of all business. That left woebegone Horseshoe Baltimore, the casino that Caesars Entertainment forgot, with just $16 million, 13% below last year and 17% down from 2019. MGM, meanwhile, raked in $72 million, a 6.5% slippage, while Maryland Live booked 63%, up 2%.

“If you were surprised you haven’t been paying attention.” So wrote Deutsche Bank analyst Carlo Santarelli of yesterday’s Station Casinos earnings release. He added, “it should come as no surprise that RRR reported results that were softer than our forecasts,” which were in themselves pessimistic. Station execs pointed to tough 2022 comparisons, especially in April, as well as their sports books getting cleaned out by Las Vegas Golden Knights bettors. Almost a million dollars of incremental utility costs also accounted for the miss and the latter factor should be considerably worse next quarter. Summarized Santarelli, “if you paid attention to [Boyd Gaming], you got almost exactly what you would have expected from RRR this evening.”