{"id":19299,"date":"2017-01-23T13:28:12","date_gmt":"2017-01-23T21:28:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/?p=19299"},"modified":"2017-01-23T13:28:12","modified_gmt":"2017-01-23T21:28:12","slug":"ideas-plentiful-funding-scarce","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/ideas-plentiful-funding-scarce\/","title":{"rendered":"Ideas plentiful, funding scarce"},"content":{"rendered":"

Maybe the third try will be the charm. Australian entrepreneur Josh Kearney<\/strong> has announced an $800 million, extreme-sports-themed resort, to arise just northeast of Town Square Mall<\/strong> (built on the grave of the troubled Vacation Village Casino<\/strong>). The \"\"Edge<\/strong>, as it’s called, will have two swimming pools, 614 hotel rooms, more sporting options than you can shake a racquet at<\/a> and (of course) a casino. As covered by an eagerly skeptical Las Vegas Review-Journal<\/em>, it’s Kearney’s third shot at a Sin City development, previous attempts having included 2013’s never-built Vegas Extreme<\/strong>, which would have cost a mere $50 million. Kearney wasn’t forthcoming with details of financing but, with Wynn Paradise Park<\/strong> having gone on indefinite “hold,” this is Wall Street<\/strong>‘s best chance of funding a new body of water along the Las Vegas Strip<\/strong>. The R-J<\/em> isn’t wrong to look a little askance at Kearney’s dream. Except for aptly named\u00a0Lucky Dragon Casino<\/strong>, success has been scarce<\/a> along the Strip of late.<\/p>\n

* “The casino is the catalyst that makes the resort work,” says one expert with regard to a $2.3 billion resort planned for Australia<\/strong>‘s Gold Coast, one of several projects whose finances are wobbling<\/a> under unstable VIP play –down 45% in the first 23 months of FY17. The unresolved fate of The Crown 18<\/strong> has further added to the uncertainty.\u00a0\"\"\u201cBeijing<\/strong>\u00a0has been a bit stricter about allowing access of money into\u00a0Macao<\/strong> and the ability to raise funds for a project like this is directly impacted,\u201d said Justin Fung<\/strong>, CEO of Aquis Australia<\/strong>, which has temporarily put the kibosh on a $7.6 billion mega resort project.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of these ambitious plans were conceived prior to the crackdown on corruption by the Chinese authorities, which has hit casino revenues in\u00a0Macao and elsewhere,\u201d explains Bond University<\/strong> boffin Sudhir Kal\u00e9<\/strong>. One company that says it is standing fast is Crown Resorts<\/strong>, which has committed $1.5 billion to a Sydney<\/strong> megaresort. But James Packer<\/strong>‘s company may have to rethink its business plan, which scorned video poker and low-limit tables. It’s hard to have champagne tastes when your players have a beer budget.<\/p>\n

* \u201cThey\u2019re already a poor tribe. I see it as imminently unfair to this tribe. It\u2019s a shame that this was allowed to happen.\u201d Thus spoke state Sen. Rob Cowles<\/strong> (R), on behalf of the Stockbridge-Munsee Band of Mohican Indians<\/strong>, which is being pushed into an economic corner by a expansion $33 million Ho-Chunk Wittenberg<\/strong>. A study commissioned by the tribe determined that the Stockbridge-Munsee would lose $22 million<\/a> in annual revenue. (Two Ho-Chunk casinos would lose $8 million but that would be more than recouped by the extra $45 million projected to be gained by an upsized Wittenberg facility.) While Gov. Scott Walker<\/strong>‘s administration looks askance on casino expansion, it has studied the Ho-Chunk proposal and found it within the bounds of the tribe’s compact with the state. A Stockbridge-Munsee lawsuit appears inevitable.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Maybe the third try will be the charm. Australian entrepreneur Josh Kearney has announced an $800 million, extreme-sports-themed resort, to arise just northeast of Town Square Mall (built on the grave of the troubled Vacation Village Casino). The Edge, as … 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":[103,14,140,22,96,189,206,62,32,214,9,20,38,170],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19299"}],"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=19299"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19299\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19302,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19299\/revisions\/19302"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19299"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19299"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19299"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}