Stiffs and Georges

Rub a dub-dub, three companies in a tub called Rock Ohio Caesars. In emulation of Nevada’s built-first-license-later system, the Ohio Casino Control Commission is just getting around to mulling the bonafides of Horseshoe Casino Cleveland’s shareholders. Little-publicized minority partner Lyle Berman (left, who owns a 10% stake) got a clean bill of health from Spectrum [...]

Barring a huge reversal from the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, the long and mostly inept saga of Foxwoods Philadelphia has finally come to a conclusion. The politically juiced-in trio of Ron Rubin, Lewis Katz and Comcast Chairman Ed Snider (collectively known on S&G as Sniderkatz) got a 6-1 thumbs-down from the Commonwealth Court. Sniderkatz was one [...]

Here’s a casino-development story with several personal angles. When I lived in Minneapolis and wrote from the since-defunct Twin Cities Reader, my publisher was R.T. Rybak. Now he’s mayor of the city and is trying to hold onto the perennially underachieving Minnesota Vikings. He’s floated several formulas, one of which entails licensing a casino on [...]

Las Vegas Review-Journal newshound Norm(!) Clarke reports that, in January, the Nevada Ballet Theater’s annual honoree will be … wait for it … Eva Longoria. What a concept: Fail miserably at business, get an award! S&G looks forward to future NBT recognition of Tom Barrack, James Packer, Jeffrey Soffer, Ian Bruce Eichner, Lyle Berman, Ed [...]

Those who go around, come around. The newly unveiled management team for the Margaritaville Casino in Biloxi has a distinct aura of déja vu. CEO Tom Brosig used to be Lyle Berman’s right-hand man at Grand Casinos, whose Biloxi casino was gobbled up by Park Place Entertainment and later by Harrah’s Entertainment. As you’ll recall, [...]

Aw, isn’t this great? After Gov. John Kasich (R-OH) made the ludicrous claim that Ohio voters didn’t know what they were getting into when they approved a casino initiative in 2008, his legislative allies are trying to up the ante. They wanted the state’s casinos taxed on gross receipts, which Gaming Today erroneously blamed on [...]

Here at S&G, we think the Caesars brand is more than worthy of the Queen City. Others don’t share our enthusiasm. Using the Horseshoe hoofprint doesn’t make sense, given that Harrah’s Entertainment rather expensively deployed that just downriver in Evansville. However, the Cincinnati Enquirer rather snootily informs us that the Caesars moniker is “reserved for [...]

Analysts at J.P. Morgan are downright bullish on Las Vegas Sands, raising their stock price target by over 25% (to $29/share). Their ebullience is motivated in large part by expectations for Marina Bay Sands, which they estimate will garner 55% of the Singapore casino market, along with cash flow of $904 million (up from $751 [...]

“I don’t think we’re counting on them carrying the ball like we thought they would,” is the bottom line of a Wall Street Journal story on Las Vegas Sands‘ failure to complete $743 million Sands Bethlehem. Even though he once spouted cash-flow projections the begged credulity, CEO Sheldon Adelson now says it was a [...]

Boyd Gaming CEO Keith Smith weighs in on the subject of emerging markets. Significant by its omission: Florida. Boyd got its fingers burnt down there and knows better than some in the industry that it’s not the Land of Opportunity (except for the Seminole Tribe, that is).
Sophie Gibbons’s Choice. In his proposed budget, Gov. Jim [...]

“If there was this kind of trepidation in Las Vegas, there’d be no Las Vegas.” — a reader’s reaction to the one-step-forward/two-steps-backward dysfunction that is ongoing in Kansas. Then again, it could soon be moot.

For those of you who aren’t following it, here’s what you’ve been missing:
• Station [Casinos] shuts Cherry @ Red Rock [Resort], ends flirtation w. Strip-ish nightlife. In Summerlin? Right casino, wrong place. http://tinyurl.com/ye36uqm
• @IOC_Brand Jim Perry, Virginia McDowell & Co. are classy lot. That’s why we made Argosy [Gaming] “Company of the Year” when I [...]