Gaming revenues in Macao rose 16% in April, a result that Deutsche Bank analyst Carlo Santarelli deemed “modestly better than expected.” That’s damning with faint praise. JP Morgan analyst Joseph Greff also 
shrugged off the numbers as “about as expected.” He added that VIP play was outpacing growth in the mass-market sector. Against this backdrop comes news that opening of MGM Grand Cotai will miss the Golden Week holiday, although MGM Resorts International CEO Jim Murren promised, “it’s going to open this year for sure and it’s going to be very spectacular.” Still, you’d think completion by Golden Week would have been a higher priority, no matter how spectacular your new megaresort. MGM’s biggest challenge will be obtaining a viable number of table games, as it has the least number of any Macao operator that can be cannibalized from MGM Grand Paradise. On the plus side, MGM achieved a 13% increase in slot play while cutting its inventory by 14%. It also improved cash flow from $114 million in 1Q16 to $143 million in 1Q17.
* Shady casino speculator Shawn Scott’s machinations in Maine are drawing the ire of legislators, particularly after it emerged that sister Lisa Scott, ostensibly a financial backer, was acting as a cutout for backers in Nevada and Japan. While Lisa was saying “I personally plan to oversee this project and am committed to assembling a world-class team resulting in a facility that all of Maine can be proud of,” 
brother Shawn was planning a flip. Said state Sen. Garrett Mason (R, pictured), “we have major corruption issues in front of us here. I would just say that if the government of Laos thinks you’re corrupt, we have a major problem.” (Shawn Scott was kicked out of Laos; the dispute is currently under arbitration.)
Solons are considering a couple of options. One would be to pre-empt the referendum by voting to approve the casino, then holding another vote to revoke the first one. (It’s obscure but legal.) An alternative pitched by Sen. Russell Collins (R) would bar casino operators from selling their facilities for 10 years after opening. Since Scott would never pass muster with Maine regulators, that would leave him with an asset he couldn’t monetize or flip. Legislators of both parties are so keen to be rid of the Scotts that they allowed the Collins bill to be introduced late in the session. Where Shawn Scott goes, trouble follows.
* Although the Trump administration was expected to be hostile to 
tribal-gaming interests, the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe has received intelligence that the Interior Department will reverse itself and allow Project First Light to move forward. The new decree is expected in six weeks or so. Still, the Mashpee Wampanoag are playing it cool, keeping construction on hold until Washington, D.C., makes its feelings known.
* Unless PokerStars removes itself from contention for Internet gambling in California, it’s extremely unlikely that prevailing legislative stalemate will be resolved. “At one point the debate became so heated that [Assemblyman Adam] Gray had to call in the sergeant at arms,” reports Global Gaming Business. The PokerStars coalition is crumbling a bit, having lost the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians having withdrawn. The continuing impasse has caused Assemblyman Reggie Jones-Sawyer to admit defeat for the current legislative session. There’s too much money at stake in California for PokerStars to walk away but there never will i-gaming in the Golden State if it doesn’t.
* Zombies are coming to Fremont Street, thanks to a Walking Dead-based attraction. AMC, which carries the show, seemed a bit nonplussed about the whole thing, having declined to comment on the 18-minute fright experience.
* Casino competition in upstate New York is such a novel development that the papers are taking the pulse of the business on a week-by-week basis, which has led to minor fluctuations in revenue being treated like cataclysmic events.
