Rough justice for Adelson; Horseshoe Baltimore gains strength

In the end, the Macao government was scarcely more generous with Sheldon Adelson than it had been with Steve Wynn. Adelson’s Parisian Macao will open with 100 table games, get another 25 on New Year’s Day and 25 more a year after that. Of course, Adelson can still move tables from his many Cotai Strip™ casinos to bring Parisian up to a full inventory of 450 tables. Of those, 50-60 will be devoted to VIP play. (The casino will also have 1,600 slots.) “Following the 100 tables allocated to Wynn Palace, there are theoretically over 1,300 still available for allocation between now and 2022,” reported a Sanford Bernstein analyst. After Sociedade de Jogos de Macau opens Grand Lisboa Palace next year, there aren’t any major new projects in the pipeline of which we’re aware, so most of the new-table game allocations will probably be incremental increases at existing properties, as we’re seeing at Parisian. Wynn Palace, built for 500 tables, is presently making do with 350. The one company that might have something to worry about, analysts say, is MGM Grand Paradise, which has very few tables it could transfer to MGM Cotai if the government is as tight-fisted with MGM and Pansy Ho as it has been with Adelson and Wynn.

Others fret about a “deteriorating” sort of Macao visitor. This supposedly less-desirable customer is held responsible for tighter spending habits and a downturn in hotel-room rates. At least one optimist among the chorus of pessimistic voices was Union Gaming Group‘s Grant Govertsen. He wrote, “Given the current state of market-wide demand and the fact that the Parisian gets 150 tables, the Parisian won’t miss a beat.” That’ll be music to Adelson’s ears.

* As far as we know, Genting Group still has its heart set on a panda refuge as part of Resorts World Las Vegas. That gives us as good an excuse as any to link to a picture of cuddly baby pandas and some good news about the survival prospects of the species. Who says S&G never runs any feel-good stories?

* The City of Baltimore has to feel good about the economic performance of Horseshoe Baltimore, on pace to gross $300 million in its second full year of operations, of which nearly $23 million will find its way into civic coffers. Acknowledging some first-year hiccups, General Manager Erin Chamberlin remarked, “When you first open up in a brand-new market, and this not an established gaming market, you are not really sure what guests are looking for. But we have learned over time what customers prefer and we have tailored our marketing efforts to make us more successful. What has been achieved here in two short years is pretty spectacular. Right now we are in a good rhythm and folks are pretty aware of us.” She professes not to be worried by MGM National Harbor and, indeed, Horseshoe’s inner-city market position may shield it from MGM’s siren song. Suburban Maryland Live is not expected to be so lucky.