Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

Blame it on baccarat

Nevada casinos won 5 percent less from gamblers in January than a year ago and gaming revenue on the Strip was down 1 percent from last year.

In the Las Vegas Valley, off-Strip casinos are hurting the most, with a year-over-year decline of 16 percent in North Las Vegas and along the Boulder Strip, 7 percent downtown and 5 percent across the rest of Clark County, the Gaming Control Board reported today.

"We believe the Las Vegas locals market is correlated to Las Vegas home prices," Morgan Stanley stock analyst Celeste Mellet Brown said, noting that single family home prices fell 28 percent in February.

A closer look at the Strip reveals that lucky baccarat players were largely to blame for the drop.

On the Strip, baccarat revenue in January fell 10 percent because gamblers were luckier than they were a year ago, which all but wiped out a 6 percent increase in the volume of baccarat play, Bear Stearns stock analyst Joe Greff said in a research note to investors. Excluding baccarat, Strip revenue for the month was roughly flat from a year ago - reflecting some analysts projections.

Strip revenue would have been down 2 percent had gamblers been luckier at slots, Brown said. Slot players won a smaller percentage of bets in January than they did a year ago, though table players were luckier.

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