{"id":18066,"date":"2016-04-12T09:56:08","date_gmt":"2016-04-12T17:56:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/?p=18066"},"modified":"2016-04-13T09:38:19","modified_gmt":"2016-04-13T17:38:19","slug":"good-year-for-atlantic-city-sands-slapped-with-fine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/good-year-for-atlantic-city-sands-slapped-with-fine\/","title":{"rendered":"Good year for Atlantic City; Sands slapped with fine"},"content":{"rendered":"

Free market forces did what governmental intervention and flashy marketing campaigns could not: They steadied Atlantic City<\/strong>‘s casino economy. With the dead weight of four \"resorts-atlantic-city\"casinos — Revel<\/strong>, Showboat<\/strong>, Atlantic Club<\/strong> and Trump Plaza<\/strong> — jettisoned, profits not only steadied, they improved. Last year’s $547 million operating profit represented an increase in excess of 40%. Carl Icahn<\/strong>‘s people, however, need to keep their\u00a0eye on the ball. While the boss was chasing Trump Taj Mahal<\/strong>, profits at Tropicana Las Vegas<\/strong> fell 22%. New Jersey Casino Control Commission<\/strong> Chairman Matt Levinson<\/strong> called the phat numbers<\/a>\u00a0“an indication that the market is stabilizing after several years of turmoil. Every single operator reported a very solid performance for the year.”<\/p>\n

The biggest winner, as it were, was Resorts Atlantic City<\/strong>, where the Mohegan Sun<\/strong> management team led it to a 525% increase in profitability. Tilman Fertitta<\/strong>, who once came close to giving up on Atlantic City, oversaw a 396% improvement at Golden Nugget<\/strong>. The repositioning of Bally’s Atlantic City<\/strong> as a grind joint also worked to its benefit, with profit up 77%. Even the lowly Taj went from a $1 million loss in 2014 to a $3 million profit, putting a cheerful postscript to the otherwise lamentable Bob Griffin<\/strong> tenure. Online, relief in the form of PokerStars<\/strong>, can’t come soon enough for Resorts Digital<\/strong>, where operating losses increased 293%. Caesars Interactive<\/strong>, by contrast, pivoted from a 2014 loss to a 2015 profit of $4 million. The lowest ADRs were at Resorts, the highest — no surprise, this — at Borgata<\/strong>, where rooms averaged all of\u00a0$129.06 a night. The occupancy champ, however, was Caesars Atlantic City<\/strong>, 87% of its rooms taken, while the Taj averaged a dismal 49%. Griffin would probably try to argue that his hotel wasn’t half-empty, it was half-full.<\/p>\n

* It cost Las Vegas Sands<\/strong> $9 million to not admit to wrongdoing in a series of Chinese transactions that drew SEC<\/strong> scrutiny. The casino giant did, however, say that the SEC’s \"Adelson\"finding were “consistent with those found by its internal audit committee,” according to Reuters<\/strong>. The actions that Sands says weren’t wrong included using a “beard” to try and purchase<\/a> a Chinese Basketball Association<\/strong> team (illegal for foreigners doing business in China<\/strong>), as well as concealing efforts to buy a Beijing<\/strong> building, along with assorted other irregularities. Former Sands China<\/strong> CEO Steven Jacobs<\/strong> is claiming vindication, saying that the matters at issue wouldn’t have arisen without his wrongful-termination lawsuit, a contention pooh-poohed by Sands. The latter’s payroll will grow for the next two years, as the SEC is requiring it to hire an independent compliance consultant. Maybe Sheldon Adelson<\/strong> didn’t<\/em> do anything wrong but he was sailing pretty close to the wind.<\/p>\n

* In an effort to increase the acceptability to lawmakers of daily fantasy sports, both FanDuel<\/strong> and DraftKings<\/strong> are dropping amateur contests from their betting offerings. The move was lauded by NCAA<\/strong> President Mark Emmert<\/strong>, who wrote, “this action culminates months of hard work between all parties to reach a place that is good for amateur sports and, most importantly, the young people who participate.” DFS operators aren’t giving up much — 3% of their market — in return for what blogger Brian K. Tremblath<\/strong> calls the appearance that DFS is a responsible actor, capable of self-regulation.<\/p>\n

* Macao<\/strong> lawmakers are “collecting more data” on the economic impact of a potential ban on smoking on casino floors<\/a> and — more dire still — in VIP private salons. Junket operators, predictably, are dead set against making their high-roller clients go smoke-free. Besides, would Macao’s reputation for “hard, desperate gambling” be the same without a cloud of cigarette smoke? Ninety-nine percent of punters surveyed say it would<\/a>. In other Macanese news, Deutsche Bank<\/strong> analysts are projecting a 27% return on investment<\/a> from Wynn Palace Cotai<\/strong>, even with the new casino taking on $100 million in labor costs from Wynn Macau<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

* Congratulations to Palace Casino<\/strong>, in Biloxi<\/strong>, winner of nine<\/a> Gulf Coast Best of Dining\u00a0dining awards from Casino Journal<\/em> magazine.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Free market forces did what governmental intervention and flashy marketing campaigns could not: They steadied Atlantic City‘s casino economy. With the dead weight of four casinos — Revel, Showboat, Atlantic Club and Trump Plaza — jettisoned, profits not only steadied, … 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":[23,60,82,18,14,117,7,37,62,35,167,178,25,12,74,32,129,21,169],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18066"}],"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=18066"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18066\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18087,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18066\/revisions\/18087"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18066"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18066"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18066"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}