Biden, vaccine give tourism hope; Cirque du Soleil in crisis

John Niser, head of the International School of Hospitality & Tourism Management at Fairleigh Dickinson University, told the Globe, “We can’t underestimate the good-will factor of a Biden administration around the world with companies and visitors that are significant to our economy. With Biden, you have a seasoned politician. He’s not going to be going around saying silly things. That’s going to go a long way.” Such growth in business travel that occurred under Trump (in the low single digits) is described as “downright dismal” when measured against other nations. Mexico, Trump’s bete noir, was up 49%. In 2015, the U.S. attracted 14% of global travelers. That was down to 12% by 2018. Reports the Globe, “While that drop may sound minuscule, the U.S. Travel Association projected that the decline in market share represented losses to the U.S. economy of 14 million international visitors, $59 billion in international traveler spending, and 120,000 jobs.”

Turning this around isn’t as simple as fumigating the Oval Office. There are 300 million Americans in need of a Coronavirus vaccine and the number of doses that can be produced is but a fraction of that. And you have to take it twice. Plus, it must be stored in (to put it mildly) subzero conditions, which impinges distribution. Still, academics like Heider College of Business prof Robert R. Johnson hold out hope: “Without question, the inauguration of Biden will positively impact inbound U.S. tourism. One need look no further than the U.S. higher educational system for a parallel with U.S. tourism. Colleges and universities are reporting dramatic increases in interest from international students in light of the Biden-Harris victory. The same shift will take place in a post-Covid world with respect to U.S, tourism. There is a pent-up demand on two fronts—health and atmosphere. With both likely to improve by the second half of 2021, we could witness a boon in U.S. tourism, providing a boost to the U.S. economy.” If that sounds Pollyannaish, both gaming-industry experts and Wall Street analysts have been projecting a similar trajectory.

Last week, Cirque du Soleil was spinning the closing of Zumanity as a positive. (MGM Resorts International was quick to lease the theater to Terry Fator for an indefinite period of time.) Vital Vegas author Scott Roeben isn’t buying it. He looks beyond Cirque’s Las Vegas Strip contract extensions to the troupe’s underlying financial problems and thinks that Ka and Love might also be on the chopping block. Not only does Cirque exist largely in theory at this point, private-equity recklessness has lumbered it with $1 billion in debt, adding CdS to the list of good things in gaming that have been ruined by private equity ineptitude and forced into Chapter 11. Losses are mounting exp0nentially, from $10 million (2017) to $71 million (2018) to $80 million last year. The mind reels at the thought of the 2020 bottom line. Writes Roeben, “We’ve heard Cirque doesn’t want to reopen its shows while the mask mandate is in place, and there’s no end in sight for those protocols.” Prepare thyself for a long, Cirque-less future.

Kudos to Grosvenors Casinos in the United Kingdom on the responsible-gaming front. It has installed hourly “Reality Checks,” to let you know how long you’ve been playing. It also be set to 30-minute increments.

No, we didn’t miss the news that Elaine Wynn is out as Wynn Resorts‘ number-one shareholder (putting 9% of the company up for grabs) nor that Steve Wynn (seen with his current wife) is free, in theory, to apply for a Nevada gaming license again, putting him back on the prowl—and many would welcome him back to the Strip. But we’re slated to write a Question of the Day on the subject and don’t want to pontificate until we’ve been properly briefed. Sorry.