And then there were nine … New York City casino applicants, that is. Yesterday, Las Vegas Sands COO Patrick Dumont—the guy who gave you the Luka Doncic trade—announced that the company wouldn’t be taking a bite of the Big Apple after all. It’s walking away from Sands Nassau and everything that comes with it, on the grounds that iGaming, if approved, would make New York State an unprofitable market.
Continue reading Sands Quits, Bally’s Folds
Never able to resist the sight of an open mike, Bally’s Corp. Chairman Soo Kim has been doing interviews Down Under, on the subject of his acquisition (at a rock-bottom price) of troubled Star Entertainment. The results were even more dismaying than one feared. Kim’s message to Australia about Star: “Everything you knew is over.” Kim told the Sydney Morning Herald that “the company’s luxury casinos will need to lose some of the glitz and glamour as they start life over from scratch.” That’s right. He’s going to reinvent the company’s three state-of-the-art casinos as—Guess what?—grind joints.
Continue reading Bally’s Race to the Bottom
Today’s S&G is written with a heavy heart, as we have little good news to impart. At least there was a mixed signal from New Jersey. Gamblers went to Atlantic City less … but played online more. Terrestrial casinos were down 3.5% to $231 million, whilst iGaming was up 23.5% to $244 million, outgrossing Atlantic City for the second straight month, as the Garden City casino industry consumes its own tail. Mind you, traditional casinos got left out of much of the iGaming action, dominated as it was by DraftKings (25%) and FanDuel (21.5%) with BetMGM (22%) sandwiched in between. Good news for Bally’s Corp.: It garnered 2.5% of the action, giving them something to crow about at the impending earnings call, still TBA.
Continue reading Gloom, Doom & Atlantic City
Las Vegas just lost a lot of class. Elaine Wynn died yesterday and, with her, a golden age in Sin City. She tempered then-husband Steve Wynn‘s worst impulses (albeit not enough of them) as the ministering angel of Wynn Resorts and its precursor, Mirage Resorts. We feel unqualified to write Ms. Wynn’s obituary but will hasten to note that the tributes have come flowing in from far and wide, including from competing casino companies, which is quite unusual. (Try to imagine Frank & Lorenzo Fertitta penning a verbal bouquet to Tilman Fertitta. You can’t.) Ms. Wynn consistently strove to make Las Vegas a better place and we thank her for that. We’d love to be remembered so fondly when we shuffle off this mortal coil … but we’re no Elaine Wynn.
Continue reading A Class Act; Atlantic City Mailbox
After a pretty bad February, casino performances rebounded slightly in March, at least sufficiently to probably salvage the quarter. The headline item was Illinois, where grosses seemed to pogo-spring 12%. However, on closer inspection (i.e., a same-store basis) they were just 1% higher. In other words, everybody except the newcomers was treading water.
Continue reading A Mild March Thaw
Congratulations, Bally’s Corp. You’re the tiny dog that caught the enormous car. What do propose to do with it? In case you missed it, Star Entertainment was so desperate for financial relief that it accepted a teensy, $180 million buyout offer from Bally’s for 57% of the company. An infusion of capital from Down Under publishing baron Bruce Mathieson subsequently lowered Bally’s upfront cost to $120 million. That’s $40 million per megaresort, which sounds pretty sweet on the face of it.
Continue reading Guppy Swallows Whale
Big Gaming was liberated from hundreds of millions of dollars in market capitalization yesterday, as the stock market went into shock. So burdensome, all that money. The Dow Jones average plunged nearly 1,680 points before hitting bottom and gaming stocks suffered disproportionately from tariff-related woes on Wall Street. Kudos to the oft-lamentable Las Vegas Review-Journal for covering a story which the legacy media has otherwise done its best to ignore.
Continue reading Money for Nothing
Say what you like about Bally’s Corp. Chairman Soo Kim. He’s bipartisan when it comes to greasing the gears of power with cash. One never forgets how the then-mayor of Chicago, a certain Lori Lightfoot (D), short-circuited her own selection process for a Second City casino the moment Kim crossed her palm with $40 million. Bally’s got the nod hor concours in what was corruption plan and simple. Now Kim has his eyes on a bigger prize: the White House.
Continue reading A Boy Named Soo
We warned you. Last week we predicted February’s casino numbers in Las Vegas (and indeed in Nevada) wouldn’t be pretty. And they’re not. The Las Vegas Strip plummeted 14% and the Silver State overall was down 9%. Mind you, the plunge had more than a little to with February 2024 seeing a Super Bowl in Las Vegas while February of this year had no such drawing card. Indeed, Super Bowl Weekend in Sin City this year was reported to be pretty weak. In case you’re wondering, when compared to 2023, the Strip was still down—albeit just 3%.
Continue reading The Big Chill
Grease paint and putty noses were on full display yesterday at the Nevada Gaming Commission‘s charade of pretending to discipline Resorts World Las Vegas for consorting with criminals and laundering their money. In reality, the purpose of the hearing was to sweep the whole inconvenient mess under the nearest rug. The NGC rubber-stamped a paltry, $10.5 million fine, one which veteran casino executive and regulator Richard Schuetz termed not even a wrist slap.
Continue reading Send in the Clowns