There’s still a big budget shortfall in Pennsylvania and state Rep. Mike Sturla thinks he has at least part of the answer: slot routes. Casinos can be expected to decry this proposed solution and some 
already are. But for Sturla it’s at least partly a matter of ratifying the status quo — 40,000 black-market slot machines — and taxing the heck out of it: 33% for the state and another 5%-10% for municipalities. Regulators are going to be kept busy separating the legal wheat from the illicit chaff but Pennsylvania’s budgetary woes are so great that Sturla’s proposal — expected to raise $300 million — may be too seductive to resist.
One company that would tractable to branching out from casinos to slot routes is Penn National Gaming. Spokesman Eric Schippers says the company would “look at it opportunistically to see whether we can get gaming out of this. Frankly, there has been a lot of discussion around VGTs, so we’ve been working potential models that would work for us—protect our investment and Continue reading
“I’m a big contrarian when it comes to saying the slot machines’ time is over. In fact, if you look nationally overall, slot revenues are higher than they’ve ever been. But at individual properties, they’re down.” — casino consultant Buddy Frank on 
Shenandoah is promoting itself as the new place to hold your meeting, offering to knock $250 off of every $1,000 on the sticker price. Who could resist? After all, conventioneers could find themselves rubbing elbows with Mr. Las Vegas himself, along with Arabian horses, penguins, monkeys and wallabies — to say nothing of the terrorist peacocks. Book your event now: Casa de Shenandoah can only host 550 conventioneers at a time. (And forget about holding meetings in the adjacent theater — it only seats 160 persons.)
history has shown in Illinois, the effects can only be deleterious to casino revenues. Bars in Missouri would be limited to five video-gaming devices but organizations like the VFW could have as many as 10 per post. As usual, education funding is the premise for 
Nevada (up 12%) with the Las Vegas Strip pulling in 14% more than last year, $609 million. It didn’t hurt either that Chinese New Year fell into January. The would tend to explain why baccarat play was huge — up 44% — and the house won big, too, 52% more than last year. Non-baccarat wagers were down 3% but the house managed to win 5% more. Even flat coin-in at the slots couldn’t stand in the way of a 6% gain in Strip slot win. Even locals did their part. Locals asinos were up 6% in January 2016 and 13% more this year.
Las Vegas Strip, Caesars will implement two tiers of fees. Better brace yourself for an extra $3 a night at top-line Caesars Palace, The Cromwell, Paris Las Vegas and Planet Hollywood. And pony up an extra buck at second-tier Bally’s, Flamingo Las Vegas, Harrah’s, Linq and The Rio. Among the goodies you’re ostensibly getting are use of the gym and in-room phone calls. Seriously, who uses those land lines anymore?
CEO Lawrence Ho went completely off his rocker and vowed to spend any amount whatsoever for a casino concession in Japan. One wonders how parliamentarians are reacting to their legalization of casinos being treating as an auction. Like Adelson, he covets Osaka and would prefer to be the majority partner, which could be a serious sticking point. (Japanese companies are likely to be juiced in as majority stakeholders.) 
would represent a total cave-in on Chui’s drive to ban smoking from casino floors. The enclave seems to be working off a script supplied to it by the University of Macao (whose biggest booster is Steve Wynn) and paid for by Macao’s six casino concessionaires. Speaking of concessions, there were a few points on which Macanese officials would not yield. VIP smoking rooms would require special permits and Sociedade de Jogos de Macau CEO Ambrose So‘s pleas for a 12-to-18-month implementation period was dismissed as “too much.” Technical requirements for the lounges will also be made more stringent.
replete with elements of farce. What seems to have brought resolution was the offer to Caesars Acquisition stockholders of 1.6 shares in Big Caesars for every share they hold in Little Caesars. With Judge Benjamin Goldgar 
for “sightseeing, entertainment and gaming” 
notably on the Strip.” Mandalay Bay and MGM Grand especially suffered, as most of the increases were at low-end properties — although Bellagio had a $21 million boost. So either players are saving their pennies or they’re choosing to stay at the very top of the MGM food chain and largely ignoring the properties in between the extremes. (Due to being jointly owned with Dubai World, megaresort Aria was excluded from the comparisons.) MGM’s REIT was also a disappointment, contributing only $30 million. “Management noted convention softness, sports book hold … were a hindrance and we believe the shift from convention to leisure/casino channels at Mandalay/MGM Grand was more painful than expected,” Santarelli elaborated.
29% to $19 million. Casinos as a whole grossed $186 million, a 6% increase despite having one fewer weekend than January 2016. Tables carried the day, up 20% to $60 million, while slots ($124 million) were flat. Borgata outperformed the market, rising 16% to $61 million, with tables bringing in $20 million (up 7%) and slots 6% higher than the market as a whole.
and survey data collected from 61 workers at Station Casinos’ properties in 2015″ there exists “a grim picture of work conditions related to employee health and safety risks” This summation was ratified by workers such as Palace Station cook Adolfo Gaspar, who told the Culinary, “We have been understaffed for the last six to seven years and they don’t train people properly. The pots and pans are regularly dirty so I have to work extra hard to clean everything before I can cook, which adds a lot of stress to my job.”
Act is either repealed or amended to permit single-gaming betting. (None of this parlay-only nonsense that you have to endure in Delaware.) That’s a big “if” unless President Trump — it’s still surrealistic to type that phrase — puts his money where his mouth is about the sensibility of legalizing sports betting on a widespread basis. Or the Supreme Court could rule in New Jersey’s favor and toss the Bradley Act on the ash heap of history.
However, just for the record, let’s look at what went down (in more senses than one). For starters, the $173 million gross implies that customers were wagering slightly more than in 2016. Several big operators took it on the chin. Penn National Gaming/GLPI‘s Hollywood Lawrenceburg ($13 million) was off 8%, while Pinnacle Entertainment‘s Belterra dove 9%, to $8 million. By contrast, Rising Sun ($4 million) was only 2% off the pace and Tropicana Evansville ($10 million) was 2% up. So was French Lick Resort ($7 million).
another $1.7 million was disbursed to various and sundry Las Vegas charities. Although it’s nobody business but Wynn’s what he did with the stock, he may have felt compelled to go public with the donations after Sheldon Adelson‘s newspaper added one and one, and came up with three, assuming that Wynn had given the stock to Donald Trump in return for high visibility in Republican Party affairs. While the R-J doesn’t owe Wynn an apology, neither should it go off half-cocked again.