 Thursday May 24, 2012 |
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Is Recession Dropping Casino Revenues in Nevada?by JzeeSunday, March 07, 2010 at 07:44 PM ESTJust as I discussed the decreasing revenue of Atlantic City Casinos in our previous blog posts, today I came up with more news about casinos losing their revenue share. Why are casinos from a few states showing declines in their revenues? Is this the direct impact of the legalization of table games and other popular casino games in some states, or it is something else? I too am not able to figure out why the casinos are increasingly showing decline in their revenues. It has been reported that Nevada Casinos throughout the year 2009 could not match the figure of their collections in 2008. The Nevada casinos raised $101.4 billion in the year 2009 which is nearly 10.4 percent less than the previous year income. This has also been the largest decline of casino revenues in calendar year so far in the state’s history. Such a decline in revenues is alarming. The casino owners may get some kind of headache with their decreasing income. The state too also losses its revenue share. According to the Nevada Gaming Control Board report this has been by far the most declined figure of state’s casino income. Such low income happened in Nevada in the year 2003 when it showed 9.7 percent of decline than the previous year. The year 2008 was quite fair though it was less than expectation. Various sectors are blaming the ongoing recession as the main cause for such a decline. They believe that the recession made the tourism industry suffer a lot in Nevada, resulting in the decline of casino income as less people traveled to the state to play table games. Frank Streshley, the chief of the Control Board’s Tax and License Division said, “It’s the fourth decline this decade after never declining since we started recording annual gaming win in 1955.” (Chereb, 2010) Even the 9/11 terrorist attack could not affect the business that much the way recession is doing. According to reports after the 9/11 attack the decline was 1.3 percent and 0.3 percent respectively for the year 2001 and 2003 in the state. Reports say that all major table games posted signs of decline including the popular poker games. Except the high roller game Baccarat that attracts big spenders no other game could show a good response. The Baccarat winnings were up by nearly 26.6 percent over the year, and most revenues came in the last quarter of the year. Nevada’s state fund is filled by casino revenues to a great extent. It is estimated that taxes paid by casinos make up to nearly 1/3rd of the state’s fund. But the recession has hard hit the Nevada casinos. The tourists and the local residents have been keeping a tight hold in their unrestricted spending. Reference: This article originally appeared on Another Harvard Blog. |
