{"id":26935,"date":"2020-04-30T05:36:09","date_gmt":"2020-04-30T13:36:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/?p=26935"},"modified":"2020-10-16T07:10:11","modified_gmt":"2020-10-16T15:10:11","slug":"strip-clocked-locals-stronger-montana-reopens-first","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/strip-clocked-locals-stronger-montana-reopens-first\/","title":{"rendered":"Strip clocked, locals stronger; Montana reopens first"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nevada<\/strong> casinos won $618\u00a0million in a Covid-19<\/strong>-truncated March, with the Las Vegas Strip<\/strong> leading the plunge with a 46% fall to $300 million. Las Vegas<\/strong> locals play was remarkably strong under the circumstances, \"\"down only 20.5%, although that number may have been fattened by some end-of-February slot win (the month having finished on a weekend). Statewide, casinos were off 40%. For the first quarter the Strip has been doing the worst of the the three major segmentations, down 12%. Baccarat, however, did relatively well in March, down 17% on 25% less wagering (good luck for the house), although non-baccarat table games on the Strip were catastrophic, plummeting 66% on 71% lower betting. Slot revenue wobbled 37% ($185 million) on 57% less coin-in, which has to be one of the tightest holds (12%) we’ve ever seen.<\/p>\n

Locals slot win was off 11% despite a 54% plunge in coin-in, reflecting both tight hold (10.5%) and that leftover February win, which wouldn’t have been dumped from the hoppers until the beginning of March. \"\"Believe it or not, the Boulder Strip<\/strong> actually had a good month, up 2%, to $71.5 million. Downtown<\/strong> fell 46% to $43.5 million while North Las Vegas<\/strong> slipped 13% to $22.5 million and Mesquite<\/strong> tumbled to $7 million, -53%. Laughlin<\/strong> slid 38% to $30.5 million while miscellaneous Clark County<\/strong> fell 36% to $72 million. Reno<\/strong> plunged 55% to $22 million, Lake Tahoe<\/strong> ebbed 43% to $9 million and Wendover<\/strong>, Nevada’s reliable economic barometer, indicated hard times ahead with $9 million, a 58% nosedive.<\/p>\n

* As Covid-19<\/strong> started to spread, even a friendly game of bridge became fraught with peril<\/a>. Scary stuff. And even though the disease has driven many card sharps to playing online, the resultant revenue is “a drop in the bucket<\/a>,” bad news for states like Pennsylvania<\/strong> which are heavily addicted to gaming taxes. The Keystone State booked only $154 million in gross gaming revenue last month, while rumors are circulating<\/a> of additional casino sales in Atlantic City<\/strong>, where Bally’s<\/strong> just changed hands for a feeble $25 million.<\/p>\n

* The Who’ll Reopen First steeplechase goes to a dark-horse contender, Montana<\/strong>. Gov. Steve Bullock<\/strong> (D) will reopen the state’s casinos on a nation-leading May 4. Casino stocks perked up at the news, especially Monarch Casino & Resort<\/strong> (+17%), Golden Entertainment<\/strong> (heavily invested in Montana and up 14%), Penn National Gaming<\/strong> (+13.5%) and Boyd Gaming<\/strong> (+10%).<\/p>\n

* How much is a Hillary Clinton<\/strong> endorsement of Joe Biden<\/strong> worth? Nothing, from an oddsmaking standpoint. The futures market for Biden was described as “stagnant” at 43 cents compared to Donald Trump<\/strong>‘s 50 cents. William Hill<\/strong> narrowly favors Trump (10\/11 … a $100 wager doesn’t even get you all your money back) over Biden’s 11\/10.<\/p>\n

Jottings<\/strong><\/em>: Having been rebuffed for a Greek casino, Hard Rock International<\/strong> is taking its case to court. “Hard Rock International will ultimately win the competition for Hellenikon<\/strong> \u2026 Hard Rock is the only company to have developed a project like this before and they will do it \"\"again,\u201d said spokesman Michael Karloutsos<\/strong> … Aristocrat Leisure<\/strong>\u00a0is slashing its workforce<\/a> by 1,200 jobs and CEO Trevor Coker<\/strong> is taking a 30% cut in salary. Aristocrat rationalized the move on the grounds that “people costs” were 70% of the company’s budget. It also donated 1,700 food packets<\/a> to medical facilities in the hard-hit Philippines<\/strong> … Las Vegas hotels may be discounting their room rates but one industry pundit says don’t<\/a>. Remarks hospitality revenue manager Dan Skodol<\/strong>,\u00a0\u201cWhen demand comes back, the more lucrative customers like business travelers and event or wedding planners will be reticent [sic<\/em>] to accept price hikes.\u201d Actually we think they’ll be pretty voluble.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nevada casinos won $618\u00a0million in a Covid-19-truncated March, with the Las Vegas Strip leading the plunge with a 46% fall to $300 million. Las Vegas locals play was remarkably strong under the circumstances, down only 20.5%, although that number may … 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":[23,88,60,42,51,14,26,97,283,37,76,49,126,207,78,69,95,79,9,38,247,252],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26935"}],"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=26935"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26935\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28387,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26935\/revisions\/28387"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26935"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26935"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26935"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}