{"id":11635,"date":"2013-09-27T12:13:15","date_gmt":"2013-09-27T20:13:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/?p=11635"},"modified":"2020-12-29T06:50:18","modified_gmt":"2020-12-29T14:50:18","slug":"busted-crystals-off-the-block-rumble-in-macao","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/busted-crystals-off-the-block-rumble-in-macao\/","title":{"rendered":"Busted!; Crystals off the block; Rumble in Macao"},"content":{"rendered":"

Archie Karas<\/strong> (real name\u00a0Anargyros Karabourniotis<\/strong>), high roller and reputed casino cheat is cooling his butt in a Las Vegas<\/strong> jail cell \"Karas\"<\/a>right now. The advantage player is facing extradition on charges that he bilked Barona Casino<\/strong> out of eight grand by marking cards<\/a>. Karas’ indictment was the product of cooperation between Barona and various California<\/strong> law-enforcement agencies. If Karas really did mark cards it was exceptionally stupid to do it at Barona: That casino prides itself on always having the most state-of-the-art technology. If Karas beats this rap, he’d be well advised to take his act someplace that’s not so far ahead of the curve. (The arrest also calls the validity of Karas’ 1995, $40 million winning streak into question.)<\/p>\n

Crystals rethought<\/strong>. I guess there wasn’t anybody out there willing to throw $935 million at an ultra-high-end shopping center that is \"Crystals<\/a>most notable for its scarcity of foot traffic. MGM Resorts International<\/strong> CFO Dan D’Arrigo<\/strong> says Crystals<\/strong> is no longer for sale. More specifically, MGM “plans to increase the mall\u2019s profitability and revisit a sale in a year or two<\/em>,” which is a nice way of saying it’s not making money, isn’t it? A higher priority is to restructure CityCenter<\/strong>‘s debt load, which is being carried at 9% interest. “This is the most over-equitized development property in the history of gaming<\/em>,” D’Arrigo claims. The company’s volte-face generated a microscopic bump in the share price, but nothing to write home about.<\/p>\n

Foxwood Massachusetts<\/strong> hasn’t been approved<\/strong> by the citizens of Milford<\/strong>, let alone selected by the Massachusetts Gaming Commission<\/strong>. But that sure as heck didn’t stop the casino-on-paper \"Foxwoods<\/a>from\u00a0holding a job fair. I kid you not<\/a>. “It\u2019s the best pick-me-up I\u2019ve had in a while,” said an applicant, while another remarked, “At this point I\u2019d take anything.” Well, that’s not quite the “Go, team!” spirit Foxwoods Massachusetts<\/strong> is looking for but it’ll do in a pinch. The master plan is to hire people, move them to Connecticut<\/strong> for training, then ship them back to Milford. (I wonder how current Foxwoods employees feel about an invasion of Massachusetts<\/strong> trainees.) And if you don’t get a job at the fair, heck, you’ll still have a souvenir pack of Foxwoods playing cards with which to impress your friends.<\/p>\n

Taking a page from Sheldon Adelson<\/strong>, the CEO of SJM Holdings<\/strong>, Ambrose So<\/strong>, railed against the Macao government’s 1:1 ratio of resident workers vs. guest workers on construction projects. \"Chui\"<\/a>SJM’s huge Cotai Strip<\/strong> casino could probably use more manpower, as it’s going to take until 2017 to get the thing open at the current rate. However, browbeating City Hall usually fails to produce the intended result. Las Vegas Sands<\/strong> COO Michael Leven<\/strong> might have thought of that before calling for the use of guest workers and immigrants as croupiers. So much for economic revitalization! The administration of Fernando Chui<\/strong>\u00a0(pictured<\/em>) pushed back, warning of local “discontent among locals that tourism growth was outpacing infrastructure development” and that casinos weren’t offering sufficient amenities. Casino interests did well in recent parliamentary elections, so we’ll see if So and Leven’s complaints find a friendlier reception now than they would have a year ago.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Archie Karas (real name\u00a0Anargyros Karabourniotis), high roller and reputed casino cheat is cooling his butt in a Las Vegas jail cell right now. The advantage player is facing extradition on charges that he bilked Barona Casino out of eight grand … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[56,28,14,166,62,112,11,12,61,9,20],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11635"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11635"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11635\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29000,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11635\/revisions\/29000"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11635"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11635"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11635"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}