Background: I'm going to Vegas in June to play Colossus/Colostomy III (previously, Colostomy III: This tournament's in the bag!®), maybe a daily at Wynn, and to play $2/$5 and some $5/$10 cash. I normally go with my wife and grind low-limit pokers and free gins and tonic (previously), so I've never toted more than $5000 before.

I've read and searched about wire transfers and cashiers checks (example the first, the second, the third), and I called the cage supervisors at Bellagio and Aria, and everyone says the same thing: The money stays in your account at the cage. To play at B or Aria or any MGM property, you sit down and have the poker room supervisor go get your chips at the cage. You can't use your account money, understandably, to play at Wynn or any other non-MGM property.

There are some old threads lying around about people bringing (verified) cashiers checks, just getting a dump of yellow chips and flags at the cage and doing whatever they want. Literally every first-party source I find says that isn't allowed, because money laundering (?).

So, I guess bringing some $5k in cash (to play at non-MGM properties) and the rest wired to B/Aria sounds okay, but I'd love to know...

1. This sounds like some hassle at the time of play, during a time when rooms are going to be really busy. Any experience about how long it takes, how salty the floor gets having to deal with it for non-nosebleed games, and so on?
2. In practice, if I have the floor get $2000 out of my account, and I get up from the poker table with $2200 or $1700 or whatever, are they going to give me a hard time about just keeping/cashing the chips? It'd make life a lot easier.
3. Lots of people here have to be toting much more than this in and out of Vegas. Is there some awesome option I'm missing?

Bringing more than $10k cash through a TSA checkpoint seems LOL-terrible to me, but I'm willing to believe it if the consensus is that that's the least-bad option on balance.

For the benefit of searchers from the future finding this thread, checks and wire transfers seem to be functionally equivalent as front money, as long as you fax or email a copy of the check to the cage a few days early so they can verify the funds before your arrival.

try your pocket

I have a line at Cosmo. They don't give a **** what I do with the money. I've asked for 5k cash or tito(tickets that have cash) you could put them in a machine and walk the cash next door.


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If you're not traveling international there's no limit over 10k and no declaration you have to do. Don't say anything and just walk through security. You don't even have to take it out of your pocket. If they ask what it's for, say you're going to Vegas and plan on playing a lot of poker. Because that's what you're doing.

Don't stress about it.

That was pretty much the plan tbh, and I have TSA Pre which means I go through the old magnetometers and not the new porno-scanners that make you empty your pockets completely. The casino procedures are such a pain in the ass that I have to believe this is what people normally do.

You seem trustworthy. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

You could also open a bank account with a bank that has a branch in Vegas, withdraw upon arrival. Call and verify with the branch that it's no problem withdrawing $xk on the day of your arrival.

You can also withdraw $1k per transaction for a $1 fee at the ATM inside Casino Royale.

That way, $5 gets you $5k from your account if your bank offers you free withdrawels.

This. I've traveled with 20k in my carry on. Never any questions.

I always carry cash, I did close to 50k several times, just put it in ur carry on and run it through scanner,never any questions

Just carry cash. If you're worried about TSA then I suggest getting TSA Pre check which is less intrusive going through the detectors.

Years ago, you could have wired money to a casino and been able to get chips at the cage and then cash out at the poker room. Now they want you to get the chips in the pit similar to taking out a marker.... so yeah. carry cash or schedule ahead a huge withdrawal at a major bank which they'll probably be dicks about.

Citibank requires at least a two week notice if you with to withdraw more than 5k in cash. However, nothing is preventing you from going in multiple days in a row to withdraw 5k.

this, seems like a hassle for only $15k though

cash-don't sweat it

Done it both ways, carried it through tsa with a copy of my bank statement if asked (never was), and also since I have Bank of America, I have withdrawn as much as 12k once I was in Vegas with no issues. I think that as long as you can prove it is your money by showing the withdraw from your own bank account you should be ok. Heck, bring a few months of bank statements to prove you have that kind of legit money and shouldn't have a problem. People take cash to Vegas all the time.

I guess it obvious that you shouldn't have a bag of weed also in your carry-on when you go through TSA along with your money :-)

Bunch of pessimists ITT.

Open a bank account. Sure, it's probably not worth the hassle for $15k but then you're all set when you need to transfer $5 million back home.

Let's not try to trivialize the situation. At least recommend that he tie it up in a rubber band before sticking it in his pocket.
:=)

Seriously, you won't get hassled by TSA for 10-15k (especially if they know you are going to Las Vegas). Now, if you are bringing that kind of money to Yuma, AZ, then it might raise some eyebrows. And don't worry about carrying that much money around. The 25 y/o Chinese kid at the PLO table in the next room is probably on his 5th buy-in of 10k.

15k is well within the reasonable range to carry in your pocket. i am sure hundreds of people carry that much in and out of vegas every day. a million bucks ain't what it used to be...

actually 15k can only be secured using one of those broccoli rubber bands from the grocery store, you gotta steal it, or buy the broccoli if you're a pussy

bitcoin?

I've been getting my **** together and saving up asparagus rubber bands when my wife brings them home from the supermarket. The broccoli ones could stop cars, so I'll save those for when I run up to $40k at PLO.

What if I were a hipster wearing skinny jeans? Carrying $15k would look like I had a block of wood nailed to my thigh, which I guess might also be a thing that hipsters do.

hipsters don't gamble big

visit my website dubya dubya dubya dot broccoli-bands dot com

lossage,

Then you'd get some sort of manpurse for the cash.

Man purses are rampant in Vegas poker rooms.