Featured Articles Archive - Page 406

Caesars seeking $400 million to finish tower

LAS VEGAS, Nevada -- Caesars Entertainment Corp. said Thursday it is seeking $400 million in financing to complete an unfinished hotel tower at Caesars Palace and develop a retail, dining and entertainment corridor on the Las Vegas Strip.In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the company said funds raised would be used for the project's development and to pay various fees and expenses...read more

Pinnacle interested in move to Strip

LAS VEGAS, Nevada -- Regional casino operator Pinnacle Entertainment said Thursday it was considering a marketing alliance with a Strip casino company. Las Vegas-based Pinnacle doesn't have a Strip property, so it is looking to negotiate a partnership that would have reciprocal rewards to draw visitors to its regional casinos in Louisiana, Missouri and Indiana. "We believe it's an idea that has merit to it," Pinnacle Chief Executive Officer Anthony Sanfilippo said during the company's fourth-quarter earnings conference call. He didn't name the potential partner. Pinnacle said it was delaying the opening of its $357 million hotel-casino in Baton Rouge, La., by a few months...read more

Deal Me In: One annoying feature of randomness

Dear Mark: I read a recent article of yours on video keno so I thought you would be a good person to pose my question to. First, some background. I have been playing video keno since 1980 when I used to frequent Vegas two or three times a year...read more

Exec thrilled to land Louisiana gaming license

LAS VEGAS, Nevada --On Friday, Dan Lee was awarded Louisiana's 15th and final gaming license.A day later, both his voice mail and e-mail inboxes were nearly full.Through his recently established Creative Casinos LLC, Lee proposed the $400 million Mojito Pointe hotel-casino project on a 220-acre site in the western Louisiana community of Lake Charles.Lee, former chief executive of regional casino operator Pinnacle Entertainment, began developing plans for the site last year when his former employer canceled a casino project for the location and returned its gaming license to the state.Now, with the license in hand, Lee's attention is directed toward a voter referendum April 30, where Lake Charles residents will be asked to approve the project.This week, Lee is meeting with bankers and other potential backers to put together financing for the resort, which is expected to include at least 400 hotel rooms, an 18-hole golf course, restaurants, a spa, and entertainment amenities, including a facility for falconry and other exotic birds of prey."In a way, I feel like the dog who caught the car," said Lee, 54, who has been operating Creative Casinos out of his Las Vegas home but is now looking for office space in Lake Charles and Las Vegas.Lee has a financial backer who bought one-sixth of his company for $5 million...read more

Top-10 craziest prop bets

The human race has a long history of making crazy bets. Brian Zembic once won $100,000 when he had breast implant surgery. And yes, Brian is a man. And as of five years ago (the bet took place in 1996) he still had them, even though the bet only required him to keep them for a year.Crazy prop bets often occur between high stakes gamblers, but some of the best bets have come from people who are much more famous for other things...read more

How would you set up place bets in a craps game with three five-sided dice?

Big bucks can be made by developing casino games that the joints adopt and players frequent. This, owing to the ongoing hefty fees the bosses pay to license proprietary offerings. However, of the numerous games being devised, few get considered seriously...read more

Deal Me In: The mathematics of breaking even

Dear Mark: Now that the football season is over, I ended up pretty much breaking even for the whole season. I've read that the house edge is 4.55 percent on sporting bets. How is that figured, and would that mean I lost just under 5 percent of my bets? Dave D.Actually, Dave, you lost less than that percentage-wise, 52.273 percent to be exact, but that figure presupposes that all of your bet amounts were identical, always wagering $11 to win $10, for example.I'll get to that 52.273 percent in a moment, Dave, but, for an appetizer, let's break down a typical $11 wager...read more

Adelson envisions a "mini Las Vegas Strip" in Spain

SINGAPORE -- Las Vegas Sands Corp. Chairman Sheldon Adelson said Thursday he wants to create a $20 billion "mini Las Vegas Strip" in Spain.Adelson, in Singapore for the opening of a new entertainment feature at the $5.5 billion Marina Bay Sands, told news organizations the casino company is eyeing Spain as its next foreign gaming destination.Adelson said the company was looking at a "$20 billion project" in either Madrid or Barcelona...read more

Nevada company awarded Louisiana gaming license

LAS VEGAS, Nevada -- The former chief executive officer of Pinnacle Entertainment will have the chance to develop the hotel-casino project that his ex-employer canceled.Louisiana gaming authorities on Thursday awarded the state's final gaming license to Creative Casinos, a Las Vegas-based company headed by Dan Lee, who plans to build Mojito Pointe, a $400 million hotel-casino in Lake Charles on land adjacent to Pinnacle's flagship L'Auberge du Lac resort.Lee, a former executive with Steve Wynn's Mirage Resorts who built Pinnacle into a regional gaming powerhouse, won the license over competing bids from Penn National Gaming, which wanted to bring the gaming license to New Orleans, and a Louisiana developer, who proposed a Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Lake Charles.The commission's decision means Lee can take his project to Lake Charles voters for their approval."We're going to build a beautiful resort for that property," Lee told the Associated Press after the hearing...read more

CityCenter condos bring in $490 million

LAS VEGAS, Nevada -- CityCenter condominium sales, once anticipated to be a $2.7 billion business venture, brought in $490 million in revenues in 2010, according to figures supplied by MGM Resorts International in the company's year-end financial release.The 67-acre Strip development has three high-rise residential developments -- Mandarin Oriental, Vdara and Veer Towers -- encompassing 2,400 condominiums...read more