Great quote!

I'm not quite sure how Nevada law works but I think they might have a way out in that the final 9 are guaranteed to be paid that much. In my opinion, it's their money that they've already won; it's just a question of which place each person finishes and their respective payout amount.

Summary: That money belongs to the final 9, not Harrah's.

Harrah's badly overexpanded in the 1990s-early 2000s. They are sardonically called "The Wal-Mart of Casinos" by many gamblers because of their habit of implementing changes at newly purchased properties such as tightening of machine payouts, 6:5 Blackjack, and other changes that ultimately make the games more expensive to play. It looks like their ****ty business model has finally come back to bite them in the ass.

Haven't all the Nov 9 already received 9th place money anyways? So if it does hit the fan then they already have some of the money, although I still think the Nevada Gaming people have rules to cover the prizepools in case of situations like this.

Everyone I know that has been to the Rio always tells me it is freezing when they are playing in the tournies, maybe they should turn down the AC a few notches to save some money

Harrahs does suck, I stayed at the Rio it was a joke really. The room wasn't that bad but was outdated. The room service was overpriced, slow, and terrible. They didn't have wifi and wanted $13.95 a day for wired Internet. I got a beer from the bar and it was $5 for a bottle of Bud Lite.

bummer...

Harrah was just mismanaged.

they could start by owning at least 1 casino that isnt a huge dump

This is old news. Anybody paying attention could see this coming over a year ago. MGM Mirage and Harrah's both mis-managed their balance sheets and over-leveraged themselves. City Center is a goddamn nightmare for MGM and added 4800 rooms to the Strip when occupancy is well under 90%. Harrah's is owned by a private equity firm, which probably has less than 20% equity invested in the business. Apollo has a well documented history of aggressively taking cash out of their investments through dividends or dividend recaps, so it's not really surprising that they would be aggressively trying to grow the business instead of paying down debt. Gambling revenue on the Strip is down over 10%, which has never happened during previous recessions. It's going to take awhile for Vegas to recover, but I think it likely will - just a question of when.

Steve Wynn has done a much better job of managing risk during the current downturn and is poised to expand in Asia. Things got pretty dicey for Las Vegas Sands, but they were able to pull through and their Asian properites are doing well.

Note Prices

The credit crisis proved lucrative in another way to Apollo and TPG. The funds profited by trading debt in Harrah’s and other portfolio companies separate from their restructuring maneuvers. Harrah’s $470.5 million of 10.75 percent notes due in 2016, which fell as low as 13 cents on the dollar as junk collapsed in February 2009, are now trading at 80.6 cents, according to Trace, the bond-price reporting system of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority.

That's a 6 bagger right there folks....

Also, before we start throwing Harrah's management under the bus it should be noted that Gary Loveman basically created the rewards tracking system (Total Rewards) that targets average gamblers instead of high rollers. Every other strip casino has basically implemented a version of what Loveman came up with.

Most restaurants have very low profit margins. As a general rule of thumb resteraunts are a game of volume not profit margins.

i seem to remember there being a story about something similar to this, the remaining prizepool of the Nov 9 is put in a bank account. There was a kind of complaint from some people last year as to why the interest was so low. Harahs responded that it was due to them putting it in the safest bankaccount they could find hence v low interest rate.

so its pretty sure tht wont happen

enlightening point of view nvg ceo

The Nov 9 money is SAFE.

Its just not Harrah's who is in trouble. All of Las Vegas is in trouble.

The days when people flocked to Vegas for 1.99 shrimp cocktails and 3.99 all you can eat breakfast buffet's are LONG gone.

Rooms used to be inexpensive but now even Circus Circus which is the dirtiest Casino in Vegas charges over a 100.00 a night on Fri-Sat for a room.

Everyone is tightening their belts and so are the Hotels. Laying off people working with bare minimum staff.

I stayed at the Gold Coast last weekend to watch the final 27 of the ME play. My room there was 95.00 the towels smelled burned the air conditioner was a wall mounted one that barely worked and when I got up to use the restroom and turned on the light, 2 black bugs ran across the floor.

I have heard numerous stories about other Hotels similar to mine the past year.

People will still go to Vegas for that dream of winning it big. However until Vegas starts taking care of the people who come from Southern California which is about 43% of Vegas yearly income, they will be hurting.

Profits are down almost 13% from a year ago already. So it's just not Harrahs the Wynn may be the last hotel standing but how many people want to pay 300.00 a night for a room?

When's the last time you have been to vegas 1975?

Go to the Rio spa in Macau. All I'm sayin'













"show time"

I must say, not having been to vegas, my view on it gets dimmer and dimmer every year.

I always dreamt of going there and eating well for cheap, staying in a cheap room which was still ok and wasting a load of money on gambling.

Now it looks as if i would need to budget, and it will still cost me a lot. Sigh.

Subscribing to thread to get nuggets of business wiswom from NVG...

I raise you the Imperial Palace.



Ellis Island is a great place to eat cheap and they have good food.

http://www.ellisislandcasino.com/

Lol yes many business operate out of chapter nine. Look at GM. Its a good way to fix these dumb union contracts that go to far. So if your a union waitress at ceasars you should be concerned.

It would funny id they went bust and they had to play the WSOP final table out on the street

FWIW, I went over to Vegas for the WSOP (well one week of it) and stayed at Planet Hollywood. The room was pretty good, although all hotel rooms worldwide become dated fast until they are renovated. The maid service was good and have no real complaints. Around the strip, it seemed to be very busy and casinos were buzzing round the clock, as they were a few years ago when I went. I didn't see any massive difference to be honest - there were still hideous queues for the main buffets.

It may sound overpriced for Circus Circus to charge 100 dollars for a room on a saturday night, but presumably that is supply and demand as its the same at all casinos in Vegas - the weekend rates are double the week rates because shed loads of people come into town on weekends. In the UK, in some cities you would struggle to get a decent hotel room for less than $150 on a weeknight, so it is still good value to stay there.

Food is priced on a par with pretty much everywhere, although the choice of eateries is bewildering and there are still cheapo places if you look for them.

I've heard all the stuff about casinos going to the wall and it being a nightmare in Vegas because they can't fill the rooms and everywhere is going expensive, but I didn't see much evidence (on the surface) of it. The whole place seemed the same as it did a few years back.

Its a shame if Harrahs and MGM are having problems. Perhaps the answer is to sell their properties to individual buyers rather than having two or three 'chains' running the whole strip?

Wouldn't the Wal-Mart of casinos make the games cheaper to play? But I guess that logic would kill the fun.

They wouldn't be in trouble if they were the Wal-Mart of casinos. Quite the opposite business wise.

K-Mart maybe.