Inside Gaming: Gaming License Rules Give Investors Pause

Institutional investors such as Apollo Management and D.E. Shaw have been sniffing out opportunities in Las Vegas, but the word on Wall Street is they haven't liked the smell. The requirements to get gaming licenses are so arduous, some firms are stepping back. Casino owners have to be licensed by the state of Nevada, and reports on their backgrounds can run to more than 30 pages single-spaced. That's not keeping them out of Las Vegas, however. Look for even more condominium projects rising out of the policies once designed to clean up the gaming industry.

Las Vegas developer Sheldon Adelson is pushing to develop a 5,000-slot casino in Bethlehem, Pa. It seems he wants to rehab an old Bethlehem Steel foundry, even though gaming industry sources say the project wouldn't do much for the local economy. It looks to local officials more like a program of take-the-profits-and-run. Still, it'd qualify as a brownfield redevelopment project so it sounds community-spirited. Industry sources, however, give it little chance of happening.

Harrah's Entertainment is proceeding with its $450 million Atlantic City expansion. Construction could begin by summer's end. The project is expected to include not just an 800-room hotel tower on top of a two-story platform, but 900 parking spaces, a 250,000-square-foot entertainment complex with a pool, spa, restaurants and shops. It'll take Harrah's room count to 3,740 and should give it the nongaming amenities to better compete with the Borgata and the Tropicana Atlantic City. The expansion still needs board approval, which sources say is a slam dunk.

It's everywhere. Entertainment, that is. Its omnipresence makes it abundantly clear Las Vegas is about a lot more than gaming these days, and Steve Freiss' recent freelance piece in Newsweek underscores the point. Lee Greenwood singing "God Bless the USA" at Buffalo Bill's in Primm, Hootie & the Blowfish screaming up a storm at Silverton, the Lettermen at Suncoast and Foreigner at Texas Station. Voices from the past, perhaps, but headliners for these value properties. Who'da thunk it a decade ago -- or more?

Everything's for sale at the right price, the old saying goes. The owner of Wynn Las Vegas is a believer apparently, putting everything in the rooms up for sale. That's right, if you stay there you can take home anything in your room for the right price. It used to be you could get a bathrobe. Now you can get everything from the plasma television to the high-tech telephone or the special bed linens monogrammed with Las Vegas developer Steve Wynn's and his wife, Elaine's, personal monogram.

Gaming Wire Editor Rod Smith can be reached by e-mail at rodneysmith1@cox.net or by fax at 387-5243.

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