Author: David Mckee

Casinos in the Midwest are showing some resilience. In Illinois, they were up 1.5% in August, That’s impressive but the real headline is that they did 8% less on a same-store basis, showing that all the new gambling capacity has not yet been absorbed. Pictured above is the new design for Bally’s Chicago. It’s that thing in the lower middle that looks like a computer printer. Its progenitor, Bally’s Casino in downtown Chicago, did $10.5 million last month, not overwhelming but good enough for fourth place in the state. Or is that good?

Continue reading State of the Union

That credibility-challenged, glacially paced casino project in Norfolk suddenly has 100% more viability. This morning it was announced that Boyd Gaming was stepping in to save the Pamunkey Tribe‘s bacon. After five years of rearranging the deck chairs, the Pamunkey are no closer to breaking ground on their Virginia pleasure palace—until today. True, the city council could still queer the pitch, but what are the chances it would balk at a deal that finally gets the casino built after so much tribal hemming and hawing. As Mayor Kenny Alexander said, “Bringing in Boyd—someone with the ability and the wherewithal and experience and more importantly the financial strength to build a world-class casino resort hotel—is exactly what we need.” True that.

Continue reading Boyd to the rescue; A.C.’s dog days

Better late than never, Nevada Gaming Control Board. The watchdog group is making up for lost time with regard to renegade casino Resorts World Las Vegas. Earlier this month is slammed Resorts World and parent Genting Group with a 31-page complaint for having “failed to fulfill its responsibilities as the holder of a privileged Nevada gaming license.” Genting, in turn, had been taking a see-no-evil stance towards its Las Vegas offspring, claiming that it acts entirely of its own volition. We’ll see now if that attitude washes.

Continue reading Get lost, Genting

Fontainebleau Las Vegas‘ former owner and a fixture of S&G, Carl Icahn has been a naughty boy. The SEC caught him using his shares in Icahn Enterprises (IEP) to cover risky personal loans. Let’s leave aside the question of why someone as fabulously wealthy as Uncle Carl is supposed to be would need personal loans. How would you like to be an investor in IEP, only to learn that its namesake’s stock was mostly pledged to various (undisclosed) lenders? Caesars Entertainment, maybe you should check up on the status of all those CZR shares that Uncle Carl is supposed to be holding. Has he pledged them to any third parties who might come calling?

Continue reading Icahn gets caught

That didn’t take long. After playing tough guy for 12 whole days, DraftKings CEO Jason Robins folded his hand and announced that his much-ballyhooed surcharge on winning bets had been called off. Why? Because he couldn’t tempt FanDuel off the sidelines and into the fray on his behalf. Punishing one’s customers for the sins of politicians never made much sense and even less who when comparative small fry like BetMGM and BetRivers eschewed the loyalty-killing surcharge. ESPN Bet boss Jay Snowden weaseled on the issue, ruling out a (suicidal) surcharge for now but holding open the possibility of sticking it to players in the future. It’s another example of the keen business acumen that has got Snowden where he is today … besieged.

Continue reading You win, DraftKings loses