Wall Street expected 2025 to be no better than flat with 2024 and so far in April it’s played according to the script. That was certainly the case in Maryland, where casinos grossed $162.5 million. What secret sauce has Caesars Entertainment been putting in the food at Horseshoe Baltimore? The hitherto-hopeless casino was up for the second straight month. Revenues ascended 6% to $15.5 million, anemic for downtown Baltimore but a huge improvement nevertheless.
Market leader MGM National Harbor was flat at $86.5 million (government workers gambling away their severance pay?), while archrival Maryland Live did $59 million, a 3% dip. Ocean Downs, scene of current labor strife, was up 3% to $7.5 million, whist Hollywood Perryville was flat at $8 million. Out west, Rocky Gap Resort slumped 4% to $4 million.
They were in a mood to gamble in Illinois, where casino revenues bounced 6% … up 18.5% on an unadjusted basis. The comeback kid was little Walker’s Bluff Casino, surging 24% to $3 million. In its first month as a racino, Fairmount Park eked out $500,000 at the other end of the spectrum. Rivers Des Plaines shrugged off new competition, rebounding 4% to $44 million, while Wind Creek Southland solidified its second-place status with $17 million. Spring flooding accounted for a 44% plunge at Harrah’s Metropolis ($3 million). Most Chicagoland casinos fared quite well … unless they were in Joliet. Both Harrah’s Joliet ($9.5 million, -11%) and Hollywood Joliet ($7 million, -7%) had bad months. Could age be catching up with them?
Bally’s Casino in downtown Chicago rebounded with $11 million (+7%), while The Temporary at American Place (+5%) came up just short of $10 million, thanks to poor hold. Venerable Hollywood Aurora was up 3% to $8 million and Grand Victoria‘s $12.5 million (+2%) was good enough for third place in the state. Close on its heels was Hard Rock Rockford, catapulting 90% to $12 million. Golden Nugget Danville leapt 13% to $3 million, Par-A-Dice jumped 11% to $5.5 million and Bally’s Quad Cities vaulted 11% to $5 million. In the St. Louis area, Argosy Belle gained 10% to $3 million and DraftKings Casino Queen leapt 14% to $7.5 million, all of which bodes well for neighboring Missouri’s results.
Before we leave Illinois ... it should be noted that Bally’s Chicago has stepped in it again. Completion had already been pushed into 2027 when the Illinois Gaming Board shut down construction altogether. Why? Seems that Bally’s Corp. subcontracted trash removal to a mobbed-up company. Either Bally’s failed to perform its due diligence or simply didn’t care. Out of a spirit of charity we’re going with the first explanation. It would stand to reason, given that Bally’s is so far out of its depth in Chicago. The kerfuffle takes back 20 years, when a proposed casino in Rosemont ran afoul of its backers’ Mob ties, which included the aforementioned D&P Construction. In its carelessness, Bally’s not only failed to vet D&P, it made itself vulnerable to IGB fines “or other actions.” None of this dissipates the taint of sleaze that has clung to Bally’s Chicago ever since Chairman Soo Kim greased the mayor’s office with $40 million to land the concession. Kim may be able to push his general contractor under the bus for l’affaire D&P but that doesn’t get Bally’s any closer to having its troubled megaresort finished.
That didn’t take long. Newly appointed Resorts World Las Vegas CEO Alex Dixon has already been given the sack by Chairman Jim Murren, the power behind the Resorts World throne. More precisely, Dixon was kicked upstairs to the role of “senior advisor.” The roles of president and CFO will be consolidated under Carlo Castro, although CFOs aren’t necessarily naturals for ostensibly visionary roles. For every Dan Lee, there’s a Gary Loveman just waiting to fuck up. Anyway, it seems pretty clear that Murren is going to be calling the shots and Castro is a stalking horse for him. Dixon’s resumé (MGM Springfield, Circus Circus) didn’t fill us with boundless confidence at least in re Resorts World and Murren, who hand-picked him, lost confidence damn quickly. As Corey Levitan put it, Dixon “has been busted down to a senior advisor to the company’s board of directors.” Ouch.
Murren has exiled Dixon to the Siberia of “focusing on cross-property synergies within the Resorts World family,” in case you’ve ever hankered to stay in the Catskills or play at a ginormous slot parlor in Queens. Significantly, Murren credited Castro, not Dixon, with attracting a quartet of new execs. And with his hire of Josef Wagner to be new supremo of F&B, coming over from Bellagio and Park MGM, Murren continues to pluck talent from his old MGM Resorts International roster. That could generate some bad blood as Murren and BIll Hornbuckle jockey for casino licenses in New York City. In any event, Murren is loath to stray from his MGM comfort zone.
In the meantime, Resorts World is trying to reinvent itself around low-rollers, aiming to rebuild its slot business first of all. (You’ve got to start somewhere.) In his initial song and dance for the Nevada Gaming Control Board, Castro said, “We do see recovery coming in 12 to 18 months as that business ramps up and we become more diligent in our marketing and sales efforts. We’re confident that business will return.” (Note to self: Check back in November 2026.) All-important convention business was, Castro reported, “fantastic.” Castro’s remit includes redoing Resorts World as a cost-efficient property, which will be an interesting proposition for a casino built around appealing to spendthrifts. If Castro is right, the property is firing on almost all cylinders except gambling—a big “except” in Sin City.
Falling domino. The ongoing jihad of the White House against international tourism has claimed its first Las Vegas victim. If you haven’t been to the Burlesque Hall of Fame in Downtown by July 20 you’ll be shit out of luck. As the HoF put it, its host venue, “the Weekender has still not returned to pre-pandemic numbers and Trump administration policies make it unlikely that it will for some while.” It’s unclear why the HoF is still dining out on the dusty Covid-19 excuse when the rest of Sin City has moved well beyond it. (See also the Covid excuse-mongering at the Metropolitan Opera, which is in a similar pickle, as the public flees its leftist agenda in droves.)
We were recently asked if international visitation was so important to Las Vegas, whose tourism is 88% domestic. Well, 12% of 40 million tourists is an awful lot of fannies in the seats and dollars in the slots. We don’t need to break out the slide rule, do we? If the bottom is falling out of tourism from Canada and Mexico, it’s cause for worry. Quoth the HoF, “Museum attendance has plummeted along with the drop in tourism. Meanwhile, funders we’ve relied on are struggling as federal funding is withdrawn. And Weekender ticket sales are slow as recession looms and international visitors make the difficult but entirely reasonable decision not to risk a U.S. border crossing.” (We can’t blame them, not with ICE on the rampage locally.)
For the record, Vital Vegas reporter Scott Roeben isn’t buying the Burlesque Hall’s official story. But MGM Resorts International has been quietly axing jobs, despite CEO Bill Hornbuckle‘s public pronouncements that All Is Well. MGM claims it’s canning concierges and valets due to “changing customer preferences.” Bullshit. (“What I really want is less service” said nobody, ever.) And Wynn Resorts is putting property upgrades on hold. Oh, they’re worried all right. Aren’t you?
Quote of the Day: “They are so good at making the buffalo jump off a nickel. It looks like they hired an architect from Costco. They are successful by what they don’t spend.”—Full House Resorts CEO Dan Lee, on Boyd Gaming and its new iteration of Treasure Chest Casino, in Louisiana. Lee’s disses of competing casinos are the highlight of any Full House earnings call.
At this point its going to be difficult to make Resorts World a successful casino whoever they hire to run the place. It looks like a giant shopping mall. I am actually surprised Jim Murren is trying to turn this place around. I figured he had enough money to retire but maybe he likes to work. Good luck.