{"id":14209,"date":"2014-07-29T15:41:31","date_gmt":"2014-07-29T23:41:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/?p=14209"},"modified":"2014-07-29T15:41:31","modified_gmt":"2014-07-29T23:41:31","slug":"wall-street-viva-las-vegas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wall-street-viva-las-vegas\/","title":{"rendered":"Wall Street: Viva Las Vegas"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"cards-casino\"<\/a>\u201cResults could be lackluster, even if more states allow casinos, as is the case in Ohio<\/strong>, which we estimate cannibalized roughly one-third of its revenues from surrounding states.\u201d \u00a0So wrote\u00a0Fitch Ratings Service<\/strong> analyst Michael Paladino<\/strong>, assessing the gaming industry’s national prospects. They’re not good — but there’s a silver lining. Demand in Las Vegas<\/strong> continues to grow — heck, the North Strip is coming back to life — even as regional markets tank. They’re forecast to decline as much as 5% over the next year and a half.<\/p>\n

These numbers are putting some truth into the cliche that regional, ‘convenience’ casinos can never compete with Las Vegas because the latter offers something unique, not to mention a density of attractions with which no other casino-enabled city can rival. So, when money’s tight, players seem to be saving up for Sin City. One of the causes of regional softness catches the eye: “stagnant wages among lower- tier players.” Yes, the nickel-and-diming of lower- and middle-class workers is hurting the casino. Are there enough whales to make up for that?<\/p>\n

\"Cromwell\"<\/a>It’s like some weird, inverted form of biology in which the roots shrivel (Harrah’s Tunica<\/strong>) while the fruit (The Cromwell<\/strong>) continues to thrive.\u00a0\u201cCompared to the U.S. regional and local gaming markets, the Las Vegas Strip<\/strong> has a much broader, deeper and diversified pool of visitors.\u00a0It attracts people on a nationwide and global basis, along with a very large revenue and earnings component related to the midweek convention business,” wrote Keith Foley<\/strong> of Moody’s Investor Service<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

If that’s not enough<\/strong> to inspire a chorus of “Viva Las Vegas,” how about the big Elvis Presley<\/strong> exhibit at the Westgate Las Vegas<\/strong>, which is losing no time making a mark. Items on view will include The King’s 1976 Lincoln Mark IV<\/strong>, his earliest extant concert poster (from 1954), a ruby-and-diamond ring and a Walther PPK<\/strong>. If there’s going to be a \u00a0handgun in an Elvis museum, it damn well better have been used to shoot out a TV (and, if they could talk, the walls of the Westgate could tell us quite a few tales about Elvis and firearms).<\/p>\n

Some states are finding<\/strong> different ways of shaking money out of the piggybank. In New York State<\/strong>, it takes the form of extending racino \"AC<\/a>hours until the dawn hours. Somewhat nonsensically, tracks will be able to keep their slots spinning until 6 a.m., instead of opening two hours earlier at 8 p.m. Empire State law mandates, perhaps arbitrarily, that racinos shut down for four hours a day. Gov. Andrew Cuomo<\/strong> (D) and the Lege have been very generous to the gaming industry in New York, and this bonbon is sure to be well received, even if at least one track — Saratoga Casino & Racetrack<\/strong> — plan to abstain for now.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cResults could be lackluster, even if more states allow casinos, as is the case in Ohio, which we estimate cannibalized roughly one-third of its revenues from surrounding states.\u201d \u00a0So wrote\u00a0Fitch Ratings Service analyst Michael Paladino, assessing the gaming industry’s national … 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":[14,7,140,35,101,71,111,9,38,184],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14209"}],"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=14209"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14209\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14210,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14209\/revisions\/14210"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14209"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14209"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14209"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}