{"id":15958,"date":"2015-04-30T12:28:36","date_gmt":"2015-04-30T20:28:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/?p=15958"},"modified":"2015-04-30T12:35:44","modified_gmt":"2015-04-30T20:35:44","slug":"murren-takes-sanguine-view-straubs-struggles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/murren-takes-sanguine-view-straubs-struggles\/","title":{"rendered":"Murren takes sanguine view; Straub’s struggles"},"content":{"rendered":"

With MGM Resorts International<\/strong> having rejected one REIT proposal, in part because it relied too much on asset sales, Union Gaming<\/strong> is teeing up another<\/a>. It’s not providing \"Jim-Murren\"<\/a>specifics but says it would provide\u00a0\u201cadditional financial flexibility without the disruption of a major reorganization that could limit longer-term growth prospects for the company.\u201d That sounds like code for saying that more money would remain available for expansion and for capex maintenance, serious concerns when casino companies contemplate REITs.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, CEO Jim Murren<\/strong> seems to be preparing for the worst with regard to online gambling. He pooh-poohed disaster scenarios if Internet<\/strong> betting is nixed — and if sports betting spreads to other states, even if MGM isn’t as well positioned as, say, Caesars Entertainment<\/strong> to recapture that action regionally. “[We]\u00a0are in the resort-based business, we are not in the convenience gambling business,\u201d Murren said, in a dig at some of his competitors. Besides, he said, the \u00a0industry only had itself to reproach for being unable to get pro-‘Net betting legislation through Congress in 2012:\u00a0\u201cEveryone had a different point of view on how best to craft a bill, and it failed.\u201d<\/p>\n

In Washington, D.C.<\/strong>, to schmooze visiting Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe<\/strong>, Murren held court with reporters, covering a wide range of topics<\/a>. He had, for instance, this \"Borgata\"<\/a>choice observation on the possible marriage of casinos and fantasy sports leagues:\u00a0\u201cI don\u2019t know how to run a football team, but I do know how to run a casino and this is gambling.\u201d<\/p>\n

He also dropped a mini-bombshell by putting MGM into the running for a northern New Jersey<\/strong> casino, were the Legislature and voters to remove Atlantic City<\/strong>‘s monopoly. That’s pretty remarkable coming from the half-owner of the Borgata<\/strong>, as well as of undeveloped Atlantic City real estate. Murren’s spin was,\u00a0“The worst, I think, is behind Atlantic City” and upstate casinos would actually help it. “The market opportunity up north is vast.\u00a0If that were to pass, MGM would be interested in pursuing it.”<\/p>\n

* Glenn Straub<\/strong> continues to put the cart before the horse at Revel<\/strong>. By New Jersey<\/strong> law, he’s got to submit to what could be a very long background investigation to determine his suitability to hold a gaming license. In fact, he can’t even own the slot machines<\/a> on the property. Brace yourselves for a long closure.\u00a0As for the mooted expansion of the property, no permits have been pulled<\/a> … yet.<\/p>\n

* The private sector having tried and failed to bring passenger-rail service back to Las Vegas<\/strong>, Rep. Dina Titus<\/strong> (D) is pushing for a federal service, while criticizing the erstwhile Amtrak<\/strong> \"Titus\"<\/a>“Desert Wind” as “set up to fail.” Titus convened a meeting of federal and regional movers and shakers<\/a> at Boyd Gaming<\/strong>‘s Fremont Hotel<\/strong>, where she announced she’s renouncing her former support for a maglev line from Los Angeles<\/strong> to Sin City.\u00a0“I think the market is there. The will is there. The potential partnership is there.\u00a0We’re figuring out how much it would cost,” she said of conventional rail service.\u00a0“You wouldn’t have to build a whole new railroad. It’s a different kind of thing than building a maglev,\u00a0where you start from scratch.\u00a0I was very supportive of the maglev, but that’s proven to be very expensive. If we can get some sort of service going in the meantime, great.” As I’ve said before, when times are tough, the federal government is the last ‘whale’ at the table.<\/p>\n

* Gambling can be a solitary, even onanistic activity. Macao<\/strong> casinos are meeting the needs of lonely male punters with online escorts<\/a>, or “gamecasters.” These lovelies cybernetically hold the player’s hand through a session of electronic game play. I suspect it’s only a matter of time before somebody like Cantor Gaming<\/strong> puts this before the Nevada Gaming Control Boar<\/strong>d for domestic adoption.<\/p>\n

* In the course of covering the “Adelson primary<\/a>“, political blogger MondoWeiss<\/strong> confirms\u00a0that Sen. Lindsey Graham<\/strong> (R) wasn’t invited. That’s hard cheese for Graham, perhaps a punishment for not pushing hard enough in the Senate to ban Internet gambling.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With MGM Resorts International having rejected one REIT proposal, in part because it relied too much on asset sales, Union Gaming is teeing up another. It’s not providing specifics but says it would provide\u00a0\u201cadditional financial flexibility without the disruption of … 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":[23,60,185,7,37,171,62,11,33,157,12,130,74,8,100,38],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15958"}],"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=15958"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15958\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15960,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15958\/revisions\/15960"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15958"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15958"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15958"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}