MGM: Survey says …; Odds favor Harris for VP

MGM Resorts International wants your opinion … well, some of you anyway. In a survey obtained by Scott Roeben of VitalVegas, Leo the Lion poses an array of questions to Platinum- and Noir-tier customers. As Roeben says, it reveals more than it conceals, at least with regards to MGM corporate thinking about the company “unchartered [sic] waters.” Some of the ideas floated in this trial balloon are …

• Elimination of parking fees
• No non-hotel guests on property (which would run afoul of Nevada gaming regulations)
• The appeal of having medical staff on call
• Dividers between staff and guests
• Provision of masks and gloves to guests, plus temperature checks; and the biggie …
• Going smoke-free

Those are the highlights but there’s much, much more and you’ll want to read the questionnaire in its entirety. Oh, and you get $75 in freeplay if you receive it, fill it out and return it. And if there’s one thing players can’t resist it’s freeplay. Obviously, eliminating smoking is going to raise a lot of people’s hackles but would be welcomed by many more (especially employees). A hidden virtue of Coronavirus may be that it has brought us to a nodal point in casino history where smoking is no longer de rigeur.

* Sen. Kamala Harris (D) is tight with Unite-Here, which may be helping her vice-presidential chances. South Point oddsmaker Jimmy Vaccaro has her a +140 favorite to be Joseph Biden‘s running mate. Second, at 3/1, is Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D; anyone remember her peremptorily storming off the stage at the end of the Paris-Las Vegas debate?), followed by Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (8/1), our fellow Georgian Stacey Abrams (15/1), who nudges Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D, 16/1). Nevada’s own Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D) is 20/1 and—why do people keep fantasizing about this?—film producer Michelle Obama is 25/1. As for the main event, Vaccaro has it a tossup, giving Donald Trump (R) and Biden even odds. Place your bets … oh, that’s right; you can’t. (Also, we hear that Jill Biden gets veto power over the veep pick so Harris’ odds may be slimmer than they look.)

* We hear a lot about “vectors” of Coronavirus these days. Could the migration of sports bettors to New Jersey be one of them? After all, many of these wagering refugees are from pandemic-plagued New York, crossing state lines to have a flutter—18% of overall handle. Eilers & Krejcik analyst Chris Grove has collaborated on a study with Matthew Waters of Legal Sports Report and found a correlation. Writes Richard Schuetz, “If the average amount bet per person was $100 per trip, this would work out to 31,567.5 trips per day in January and February … The heat map of Covid-19 seems to indicate it follows a route along the transportation links between the New York City and the state of New Jersey.”

The hottest of Garden State hot spots is Bergen County, which is—guess what?—home to the Meadowlands and a FanDuel sports book. The second-hottest spot is around Hoboken, which is the nearest place for New Yorkers to go when placing a mobile wager. Nor is the problem likely to abate soon, given that (a limited variety of) sports wagers can still be placed online in New Jersey and Internet gambling is up and running, immune to disease. Still, short of closing the N.Y./N.J. border it’s difficult to see a way toward an easy solution.

* Hurry up and wait … that’s the situation in Japan, where the snail-propelled legitimization of casinos is now on hold, thanks to Covid-19. The Shinzo Abe government won’t even start to take action until January 4 of next year, which leaves pundits chewing the fat on what or what might not happen, which is basically anyone’s guess.

Jottings: Smokey the Bear won’t like this. $434,000 in European Union funds that were earmarked for upgrading detection of forest fires somehow got redirected into a casino project in Cyprus … The credit rating of GVC Holdings has been downgraded to BB. That puts it in non-investment grade. And the pandemic was supposed to be good for online gambling … The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas must not be planning to reopen soon. It’s emptying out its minibars, distributing little bags of peanuts and bottles of Gatorade to the community like bite-sized manna from Heaven … Derek Stevens could use some positive news and he got it from Century Casinos in Colorado. The latter signed Circa Sports as its Internet-wagering provider, launching as soon as May 1 … In an upbeat sign for casinos, MGM was able to price a new bond offering at $750 million. The new debt, scheduled to mature in 2025, closes for subscription May 4 … The asinine “liberate” movement has reached Las Vegas, where “hundreds” of cars, pickup trucks and motorcycles paraded down Las Vegas Boulevard in an expression of their owners’ desire to engage in high-risk behavior again.