Casino executives offer upbeat industry assessment

Robert Macy

Thursday, Feb. 10, 2000 | 3:15 a.m.

LAS VEGAS - Las Vegas has weathered concerns about overbuilding and companies that are expanding to other jurisdictions are enjoying record revenues, casino executives told an investors conference Thursday.

"Gaming continues to grow across the United States and that's good for Nevada," Colin Reed, chief financial officer of Harrah's Entertainment Inc., told attendees at the annual American Gaming, Lodging & Leisure Summit.

Bill Hornbuckle, president of MGM Grand Hotel & Casino, said the company had just posted record profits for 1999.

"1999 was simply a 'wow,' " Hornbuckle said, coming at a time when people were asking "How can the town survive?"

Las Vegas added 12,000 new hotel rooms during a one-year span with the opening of the Bellagio, Mandalay Bay, Venetian and Paris resorts, prompting concern on Wall Street and in casino circles that the city was overbuilding.

The visitor count was up 10 percent in 1999 with revenues up 11 percent citywide, 13 percent at the MGM, Hornbuckle said.

MGM's profits were enhanced by "incredible" results from their new Detroit property, Hornbuckle said.

The industry's major players are now eyeing Atlantic City.

"Atlantic City is a very vibrant market for us," said Scott LaPorta, executive vice president and chief financial officer of Park Place Entertainment Corp. He said the company's acquisition of Caesars World will allow Park Place to "dominate the center of the Boardwalk."

Robert Baldwin, chief financial officer and treasurer of Mirage Resorts, Inc., said his company continues to push development of its H tract property in Atlantic City.

"We like the market," Baldwin said. "We think it needs new product. "It's taking longer than we had hoped, but we continue to be optimistic."

Baldwin said when Mirage bought the Atlantic City property in 1995, the company hoped to have its new resort open by 2000 or 2001. Now, he said, the company is looking at a 2003 opening. The company is planning one property on its own and another joint venture with Boyd Gaming.

Hornbuckle said MGM has acquired all but 5,000 acres of a 38-acre tract for a new Atlantic City resort and is awaiting condemnation procedures to complete the parcel.