MGM covets Caesars; Rio up for grabs … again

As Carl Icahn continues to up his stake in Caesars Entertainment, the already-tortuous saga has developed some new complexities. For one, outgoing CEO Mark Frissora has revealed he wasn’t jumped, he was pushed. “The board has stated that they would like to see someone who’s a seasoned executive, someone who has certainly managed through turbulent times, adversity and been able to be tested,” he said during the most recent earnings call, which must have been painful for him to reveal. Also, after indicating that it wasn’t interested in a Caesars takeover, MGM Resorts International has reversed field and is playing Monopoly with its REIT, MGM Growth Properties, shuffling properties and cash back and forth to make room on the books for a Caesars takeover.

The real loser in that scenario is, of course, the consumer, who would find fewer real choices in the main gaming markets. As for antitrust concerns, I’m hard-pressed to see the Trump administration raising any but, if it did, the forced sell-0ff of Caesars casino-hotels would certainly chum the waters for growth-minded operators like Penn National Gaming, Eldorado Resorts and Golden Nugget.

Speaking of asset sales, it’s hard to imagine Caesars executing a one-off transaction while the entire company is in play. Also, I wish I had a dollar for every time The Rio has supposedly been on the verge of being sold. However, this time is a specific buyer named as well as a top executive — Scott Sibella, newly pensioned off from MGM Grand. Unshaven club mogul Ron Burkle, he of Soho House International, is supposedly dickering with Caesars over a Rio purchase. The Rio, the New York Post diplomatically comments, “is said to be in need of refurbishment.” You bet. Its dilapidation was one of the more visible legacies of the Gary Loveman era, right up there with the Octavius Tower and the underperforming Vegas High Roller. I wonder how Icahn felt when he read that news tidbit.

* A breeze of caution may blow over the Las Vegas economy, as household wealth increased only 1% in 4Q18, “a marked deceleration from the past 2 years of approximately 8% y/y growth. Household wealth is one of the strongest leading indicators we have for Las Vegas revenues, leading by 9 months with a very high statistical significance,” writes Credit Suisse analyst Cameron McKnight. On the plus side, the Professional Convention Management Association is “broadly optimistic on the economy, with very few expecting a downturn,” although international meetings are shying away from the U.S., due to the difficulty of gaining visas. Job gains were expected to be 180,000 but only 20,000 were manifest—”the slowest pace for payroll growth in over a year”—also clouding the economic outlook.

McKnight warns that “it superficially appears there might still be some room to wind back comps and rebates on the Strip. While the dollar value of comps has increased since the trough, as a percentage of gaming revenues, comps have averaged about 26% over the past three years, versus 22% in the prior peak and 28% in the depths of the recession.” Free play is also down, representing 7.5% of gross gaming revenue, as opposed to nearly 14% during the Great Recession.

* Snoop Dogg is getting into the e-sports business with his Gangsta Gaming League. The new variant on e-sports operates off the Madden NFL 2019 platform. The finals are being streamed live on a variety of channels (jncluding YouTube) starting today. “Featuring hilarious commentary from Snoop and Dan [Rue], beautiful women cheering on the players, and plenty of the sticky icky … the GGL will be the dankest live gaming tournament ever to go down on the Internet.” Since Snoop’s Merry Jane multi-media company operates “at the intersection of cannabis culture and pop culture,” we’ll be interested to see if any Nevada casinos want a piece of the action, although we rather doubt it.

* Boyd Gaming continues to weaponize Valley Forge Resort Casino. Yesterday NFL great Brent Celek cut the ribbon on the property’s first sports book. The venue is 1,800 square feet, with seven wickets, 29 TV sets and 30 seats. (Boyd could have done a little better in terms of seating capacity, we think.) The book is a FanDuel-branded operation and gives the Philadelphia area its fifth sports book (four in casinos, one in an OTB). Let the games begin.

* Elon Musk‘s The Boring Co. got the go-ahead to build a people mover under the Las Vegas Convention Center. It’s unclear which of three potential routes the Las Vegas Convention & Visitors Authority chose but Musk is aggressive in his optimism, predicting 4Q19 completion. On your mark, Mr. Musk.

* Sports betting is spreading in New Mexico. The Pojoaque Pueblo’s Buffalo Thunder Casino & Resort opened a sports book earlier this week, superseding a parimutuel salon. The Pojoaque Pueblo joins the Santa Ana Pueblo’s Santa Ana Star Casino as the only purveyors of sports wagering in the Land of Enchantment. The Pojoaque are jobbing in some sports-betting expertise from Las Vegas’ South Point casino, which is presumably the reason why Buffalo Thunder is the “only book outside of Nevada that has kiosks to handle both race and sports hardware and software support.” While New Mexico has not enacted sports-betting legislation, the Department of the Interior holds that it is covered by the Class III compacts that New Mexico tribes negotiated with the states.