Across the Country - October 2019
Atlantic City
had a combined casino, sports, and online gaming win of $239.9 million in October, an increase of 22.9 percent over October 2018. The increase is the latest in a 15-month-long trend driven by the addition of two casinos, Hard Rock and Ocean Resorts, and by sports betting. In October, the casino win was $202.3 million, up 0.8 percent. The sports win was $46.4 million, a 297 percent increase. Online gaming contributed $45.2 million to the total, up 69.0 percent. Slot win was $147.4 million, up 3.5 percent, and table game win was $54.7 percent, down 5.8 percent. Two casinos reported revenue decreases, Bally’s and Tropicana. Borgata led the market with $61.1 million, up 10.5 percent; Golden Nugget was second with $31.9 million, due to $16.6 million in online revenue; Hard Rock was third with $28.2 million in win, up 16.4 from 2018. But combining Resorts and Resorts Digital would move the combined entity to second on the list with $33.1 million. Of that, 62 percent was from Resorts Digital, which had a 143.5 percent increase over the previous year. That in a nutshell is the narrative for Atlantic City: casino revenue is flat or declining, while sports and online gambling is exploding.
Maryland
had its third month of decline in October, with total revenues falling 8.9 percent to $143.8 million. MGM National Harbor fell 18.5 percent to $59.9 million, Live! was up 1.3 percent to $47.6 million, Horseshoe Baltimore fell 9.1 percent to $19.1 million, Ocean Downs was up 8.8 percent, Rocky Gap was up 6.4 percent, and Hollywood Perryville was down 0.1 percent.
Massachusetts
was up dramatically because it had one more casino than last year, Encore Boston Harbor. In October, Encore generated $45. 8 million, 56 percent of the state’s total. Its table game win was $23.5 million and its slot win was $22.2 million. MGM Springfield had a win of $21.1 million, down 4.9 percent, with table games down 14.4 percent to $6.5 million and slots flat at $14.6 million. The Plainridge Park racino was down 17.6 percent to $11.2 million.
Rhode Island
continues to decline due to competitive pressures. However, $2.4 million from sports betting helped minimize the decline. Not counting sports betting, Twin Rivers was off 4.8 percent to $39.2 million and Tiverton fell 7.4 percent to $9.9 million. Without sports betting the two casinos would have been down 5.3 percent; with it, the decline was only 0.7 percent. Unfortunately, the competition from Massachusetts will become more intense as Encore and MGM ramp up their marketing. In response, Twin Rivers is diversifying – it’s buying casinos in other states to compensate for the loss of revenue in Rhode Island.
New York
gaming win jumped 7.8 percent in October, with VLT revenue increasing 5.4 percent to $172.4 million. The two Resorts World properties had $72.4 million in VLT revenues, 41.9 percent of the total: Resorts World NYC had $50.8 million, down 6.9 percent, but the company’s Nassau OTB was up 63.6 percent to $21.6 million. The four casinos reported a (non-VLT) win of $51.0 million, an increase of 16.5 percent; of the four, Resorts World had the largest win, $16.4 million, up 33 percent from October 2018. Combining its VLTs and casinos, Resorts World had a 39 percent market share in October, with $88.8 million in total win.
Illinois
casinos reported a 4.3 decrease in casino revenue to $106.8 million; admissions fell 3.8 percent to 857,498. By contrast, the VLT win was $142.7 million, up 11.6 percent year over year. In October there were 7121 establishments operating 32,823 VLTs, an increase in VLTs of 7.9 percent from last year. The Land of Lincoln has become the Land of Slots.
Missouri
casinos reported $141.5 million in win, up 3.0 percent. Slot win was $119.8 million, up 1 percent; table game win was up 12 percent to $21.6 million. By market, Kansas City was up 1.7 percent to$49. 7 million, St. Louis was up 3.5 percent to $71.3 million, and the five casinos in the “Out of State Market” reported a total win of $20.2 million, up 2 percent from last year. Statewide admissions were 2,929,084, down 4.0 percent; win per admission was up 5.4 percent to $90.37.
Mississippi
revenue was also boosted by sports betting. The sports betting win in October was $12.2 million compared to $1.1 million in 2018. All three regions posted increases: Vicksburg was up 2.6 percent to $23.4 million, Tunica was up 1.5 percent to $46.8 million, and the Biloxi casino reported $118.0 million, up 20.1 percent.
Louisiana
has not yet reported its October revenue figures. The state’s computer system was breached, and the “fix” is still ongoing. The Louisiana revenue numbers from last year are in the table above because Louisiana ranks fourth nationally in total revenue. Deleting Louisiana would distort the national picture. It is still skewed because of the inaccurate numbers, but less so than if the state were totally omitted.
Revenue from the
Ohio’s
four casinos rose 2.4 percent to $68.1 million in October. Slots were up 3.5 percent to $46.7 million, while tables were down slightly to $21.3 million. Hollywood Casino Columbus produced the most revenue, $18.4 million, up 2.2 percent; Jacks Cincinnati reported $16.8 million, Jacks Cleveland $16.7 million, and Hollywood Toledo $16.0 million. The seven racinos reported a win of $90.3 million, up 8.3 percent. The market leader for racinos was MGM Northfield Park, which generated $21.3 million in October, up 2.3 percent.
Pennsylvania
gaming revenue from slot machines, table games, internet gaming, sports betting, fantasy sports, and VLTs totaled $283.7 million, an increase of 10.96 percent over 2018. The market leader is Parx, with a win of $54.6 million, up 15.9 percent. Of that, $34.5 million came from slots, up 7.2 percent; table game win was $16.7 million, up 11.4 percent; online win was $0.6 million; and sports win was $2.2 million. Wind Creek Bethlehem was second with a win of $39.6 million, up 2.6 percent; Rivers Pittsburg was third with $30.0 million, up 13.7 percent; and Rivers Philadelphia reported $30.2 million, up 33.5 percent. Statewide, slot revenue was $186.9 million, up 0.36 percent. Tables games win was $73.1 million, up 9.9 percent; internet win was $4.9 million; sports betting win was $14.9 million, $10.3 million of which was from online wagering; fantasy sports generated $3.2 million, up 12.4 percent; and VLT revenue was $0.4 million.
Nevada’s
gaming revenue once again exceeded a billion dollars; it totaled $1.021 billion, a decline of 3.85 percent from October 2018. Slot revenue was $699.0 million, up 0.79 percent. The win from sports was up 61.6 percent to $47.8 million on a handle of $543.9 million, an increase of 2.9 percent. The overall decline can be explained by tables games and the Strip. Statewide, baccarat fell 25.6 percent to $56.7 million, blackjack was off 26.4 percent to $92.2 million, roulette was off 30.3 percent to $28.1 million, and craps fell 0.17 percent to $31.7 million.
The Las Vegas Strip gaming win fell 9.25 percent to $538.5 million, with the rest of Las Vegas and southern Nevada faring better. Downtown Vegas was up 7.1 percent to $68.3 million, the Boulder Strip was up 0.24 percent to $78.5 million, and Laughlin was down 5.4 percent to $44.4 million. In the north, Reno was up 2.0 percent to $53.1 million; Sparks had $11.8 million, up 8.2 percent; South Lake Tahoe was up 14.3 percent to $19.5 percent; and North Tahoe was down 17.1 percent to $1.8 million. Wendover fell 3.5 percent to $16.7 million and Carson Valley reported an 8.2 percent increase to $9.8 million.
The north can be affected by weather, Indian casinos, and up-and-down economies. But in truth, for Nevada’s total gaming revenue and gaming taxes, relatively matters except the Las Vegas Strip, which in October was 52.6 percent of Nevada’s total. The Strip being off by nearly 10 percent meant that a perfectly good month was ruined.
The win in sports betting in Nevada was good enough to give the state a 29.4 percent share of the national sports revenue, and through the first ten months of the 2019, Nevada’s total win is 26.7 percent of the national win. However, with the rapid growth of sports betting in other states, particularly in the form of mobile betting, Nevada’s market share will shrink.
Nationally, the total sports win of $162.4 million in October was 16.9 percent higher than September’s total.
That much growth in just one month indicates how rapidly the sports betting industry is expanding and changing the entire gaming narrative in the U.S.
