Category: Casino News

Gambling revenues lifted Missouri‘s riverboats 2% last month, reaching $155 million. Actual visitor spend was flat but 2% more people visited casinos, which is a more-than-acceptable tradeoff. Despite a 1% dip, Ameristar St. Charles (above) was the state leader, grossing $24 million. Hollywood St. Louis picked up business lost by Ameristar and then some, leaping 12.5% to $20.5 million. It sister property, River City, was flat at $20 million, while Horseshoe St. Louis vaulted 16% to $13 million. In Kansas City, there was a major setback at Argosy Riverside, down 10% to $13.5 million. Bally’s Kansas City continues to capture market share, jumping 16% to $11 million, the only casino in town to improve on last year’s numbers. Ameristar Kansas City slipped 1.5% to $16.5 million and Harrah’s North Kansas City slid 5.5% to $13.5 million. Outstate, Century Casinos was flat in Caruthersville ($3.5 million) and 2% down in Cape Girardeau ($6 million), while Isle of Capri Boonville climbed 5% to $7 million.

Having been spared being the next home of the miserable Oakland Athletics, now The Rio faces the question of whether there’s life after Caesars Entertainment. To that end, owner Dreamscape Cos. is going to try to go it alone as a casino operator. We wish them luck because they’re going to need it. Operating a casino in Las Vegas is not for the faint of experience. It puts a bucketful of problems in the lap of President Eric Birnbaum. Dreamscape says its aim is “to preserve the property’s bones and honor its legacy.” So far so good. Making a go of an off-Strip resort won’t be easy, as the newish owners of Palms Casino Resort and the many chefs over at Virgin Las Vegas could tell you. (Hell, Mohegan Sun is quite candid in admitting that Virgin is struggling as a casino.)

Private-sector gambling operators got some very bad news from the District of Columbia Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals. The latter, in a very broad construal of the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act, ruled that the Seminole Tribe—and by implication, many others—may have Internet gambling and online sports betting. It’s a decree that could “dramatically alter the national gaming landscape,” according to Daniel Wallach, unless SCOTUS intervenes to restore the status quo ante. The appellate court found that locating computer servers on tribal lands satisfies the legal definition of ‘tribal gaming,’ which now extends throughout cyberspace, effective immediately.

Our vacation has taken us to the wilds of Michigan, so today’s report will start there. Detroit‘s three casinos raked in $105 million last month, a 1.5% decline from May of last year. But it was a terrific month for Hollywood Detroit, which captured business from its competitors, up 7.5% to $23 million. MGM Grand Detroit ceded 1.5% but made $49 million, while MotorCity‘s $32 million represented a 7% shortfall. While Penn Entertainment‘s Greektown gain was not as spectacular as those of January and February (16% and 12% respectively) the comparisons have been strongly positive all year, signaling that Penn has turned the place around.

Now that the fix is in for the Oakland Athletics to get a vanity stadium in Las Vegas, the bosses of the Tropicana Las Vegas are losing no time in getting what’s really important: Imploding the old girl. Of course, they could be jumping the gun. Not a word has been breathed about how the A’s, who have consistently pled poverty to excuse their craptastic product, intend to come up with their share of the stadium money, which totals $1.1 billion. We expect some tin-cup rattling to occur once the state, Clark County and Vici Properties are too fully committed to back out. If Nevada gets off with a $380 million subsidy, it will be lucky.