My Sam's Town offers just might relate to the economy.

Sam's usually sends their offers out on an 8x11 piece of copy paper, so the fancy gray stationery was a clue this offer was different. Sam's has invited me ring in the New Year with dinner, dancing and live music -and three nights accomodations. ROTFLMAO - this offer may have more to do with age than gambling history since I've only stayed out there once or twice this year, and I get to chose from three New Years Eve party times of 4pm, 7 pm and 9:30 pm. Talk about catering to seniors<vbg>!

The plain paper offer for January is also different. Usually, Sam's offers 2-3 nights and includes a lunch & dinner buffet - this time they are including dinner for two at Billy Bobs! Hmmmm - wonder if I can find a show I really want to see in January - or if they will repeat this dinner for February or March?

When I dug through my folder looking for the NYE details, I found two other abnormal invitations from Sam's - one for a VP tournament and one for a live poker tournament. What makes these offers stand out is they are the only ones that have improved for me. My Harrahs offers have been consistent, and the Orleans has gotten stingier in the last couple of years. This is just one little example, but it makes me wonder if the local business has gone down even more than the tourist business? Two of these offers came in before Eastside Cannery opened, but that could also be a factor.

Wynn stock almost reached $39 today but is coming down a bit at the last hour of today's trading. Here's something you LV stock followers might be interested in ...

Just about 13 months ago 100% of the stock in Wynn Resort was worth about $17 billion after it reached a five year high of close to $165.00 (US) at the end of Oct 07. Steve Wynn's baby was rolling along and then the bottom fell out. If you banked the

Today that $17 billion could buy you all 21 casino and resort companies listed on Yahoo Finance and still have about four and a half billion dollars (US) in change.

OUCH!!!!

At present, Boyd is at $3.75 .... a wise investment if you have any faith in his Echelon Project getting off the ground (started) within calendar year 2009. I figure that one to be somewhat of a long-shot.

Rumor on the Strip (never rely on rumors unless confirmed by a couple of Strip casino valets) is that one of two of the Strip casinos will be closing soon.

Personally, I put no faith in that one but I've been dumb before and "dumbness" in my family is usually a long term affair.

How about a look at a different company? Herbst Gaming is a privately held company, owned by brothers Ed, Tim and Troy Herbst. Last year they bought the Primm trifecta from MGM for a cool $394 million, which seemed like a good deal at the time. Multiple marketing campaigns failed as gas prices shot up deterring the Las Vegas and California folks from making the trip.

Most of us know that they also own Terribles resort at Paradise and Flamingo, which they have spent a lot of money on in good times. As times are getting tough, this joint isn't doing so well. Neither are the other lesser casinos in Nevada and the midwest.

Herbst Gaming also has a slot route, which is an operation that manages about 7500 gaming machines in restaurants, bars, grocery stores, etc. Normally a good business, it took a big ole tanker with the smoking laws.

That's just the fuse in their explosive situation. You see, they have a little debt of about a billion and a half dollars. They have a bond debt of almost a billion dollars and the bond holders are not happy. They are saying pay up or else. Herbst said in March that it is looking to restructure it's debt or face bankruptcy. The negotiation period expired a couple of months ago and they were granted until Nov 5 to come up with something. Herbst filed with the SEC last week saying the bond holders are demanding principal payments. On Monday, the lenders gave Herbst a little more time to make good or else.

It sounds to me like the bond holders, who put the company in default earlier are saying "pay up or else". Herbst seems to say "or else what? You can't squeeze blood out of a rock." The lenders are about tired of giving extensions and may have to hire big time lawyers to force Herbst into bankruptcy and collect pennies on the dollar of the bonds that are currently worth pennies on the dollar.

The bondholders would probably like to see Herbst sell off their casinos and pay their debts. Bankruptcy is still an option. Look for an answer in less than 10 days. The answer might be "pay up now or else we will give you 3 more weeks to pay up."

OK, I've seen it with my own eyes.... what recession?
I would not say Vegas was at it's fullest I've ever encountered, but it was a lot stronger then I expected it to look. We had wait times for breakfast, lunch and dinner meals. We couldn't get on our favorite banks of machines at times, the crowds where still walking the strip at night.
From the boyd properties we visited, they'll be ok. All where bustling with customers, and not just on the weekends.

I agree. The casino stock ticker isn't a direct reflection of how Las Vegas is doing.

speaking of stock ticker-Will,did you or any of your buddies buy any of the sands corp stock offering? from a high of 122 the stock went for 5.50 they did raise over two billion dollars and a little breathing room for sands corp/venitian.

trip report from another board-"the ratio of cocktail servers to customers 1:1,about 10 people in the whole place" aliente station. wow a locals boycott will kill this place.

At the doctor's office today, I spoke with a man who said that Texas Station was empty last Saturday night. There were only three tables open in the pit, a pai gow, a blackjack and a dice table. We agreed that the Stations have become very tight.
We were at the Hilton tonight it was packed.........but there were plenty of machines available. One of the cocktail waitresses was feeling lucky to have a job......many layoffs around. The pit looked busy. At the box office, the ladies said the CW shows were sold out.
We then went to the Orleans, and it, too, was packed...........but plenty of machines available.......even the ones that are usually very busy. I was there to pick up some tickets for a different evening. One their shows was not selling well. We had paid full price for the tickets, but I've received emails offering them for half price, and heard them advertised a lot on the radio.........and this is for Sunday night. The bars with the big screen tvs tuned to the rodeo were very busy! Lots of cowboys and cowgirls in town. Again, at the Orleans, the pit was busy. No lines at the buffets at either place........almost unheard of for a Friday night at the traditional dinner time.
It looks like lots of folks in town for the rodeo, the fight, the marathon, the big cowboy/western sales and maybe even the Santa Run, but not all of them are gambling.

Tater, do you think the locals are backing away from Stations like they said would because of the way they are treating their employees with outsourcing of jobs and 401k cutbacks?

I don't gamble much. I do see a lot of people in the popular tourist spots at the popular times. There are a lot of popular events in town between now and spring break, so I don't see the volumes of people tapering off that much. I'm sure they will tighten their wallets and make the casino owners cry like OJ or the car company CEOs.

I think there is some of that about the Stations, but I think mostly that the machines are so tight, that it is not really "interesting" to go. The VP tables are going down and down, and it's more profitable to play pennies. More expensive, but more profitable. I'm seeing the same thing at other casinos, too, and we're getting some wild offers from places we haven't been in a very long time, like the Mirage. Comped rooms, play money, and some meals...........and these are not on our regular path. We probably only go to those places when we have guests that want to see them, or we go to a show there. Even Primm sends us invites to shows, rooms and food, and the only time we go to Primm is when we are travelling back and forth to/from California. Also, we don't gamble enough to be in any of the premier slot club levels, except we are Platinum at Harrah's. I get messages on the machine at Red Rock which tells me that I need "only" 200,000 more points that month to be in the Chairman's Club. Heck, we've been Station slot club members since 1994, and I barely have 200,000 points all together!
Speaking of outsourcing, I saw today that while AT&T has laid off something like 12,000 people nationwide, they have opened a tech help center in Summerlin (employing 250) to "bring back some of those outsourced jobs". I wonder if that's going to be the new popular thing..............'about time, if it is! In MHO, of course.

Friend of mine who lives in Henderson just called to tell me about the sale of the TI for approximately $750,000,000 but he wasn't too certain about that exact figure and may be a few million off either way.

He also stated that hotel rooms are available at the Orleans for $17 and at The Palm's for $35 and on the Strip for $50 at the Monte Carlo. But definitely not on weekends.

Wynn stock closed today (Dec 15 '08) at $40.76 while Boyd closed at $4.06.

Isn't anything below $10.00 a share officially called a "Penny Stock"?

Will, don't forget, this time of year is normally a slow time and traditionally, the hotel rates hit rock bottom midweek the last few weeks in December. Until of course, New Years eve.

Yes. Lee!! Thanks!!

But still, pessimism is still somewhat warranted along the Strip and throughout the LV basis as well as throughout the good old USA and I don't think we've hit the bottom jut yet.

Here is some further bad news!

Las Vegas visitor count fell 10.2% in October, the biggest drop since September 2001.

And official studies show that the Las Vegas economy is suffering a massive hangover after several years of cheap gasoline, availability of mortgage money and generous airline service.

The GOOD NEWS is that the average daily room-rates have declined by 14.3% making LV an even bigger bargain than in recent history.

gambling revenues down 22% that's huge,harrahs trying to restructure debt,to avoid bankruptcy per msnbc.lee,enjoy your platinum while you can! i do hope it goes well for wynn.,he seems to be the only one with his s--t together! state of washington casinos revs off 30%,new state budget called ugly for state workers,which i be one!,and state health and wellness programs.what the hell is wellness anyway?new set of home mortgages set to reset at higher rates,forcing more people into bankruptcy,where is the bailout for them??!!have'nt seen the bottom yet? no kidding!

Can anyone who may be somewhat familiar with the stock market tell me how Wynn stock can close at $44.67 on Wednesday and open the following morning at $49.38.

That's a hefty overnight jump for anyone who is capable of purchasing multiple shares.

Does the market for stock sales somehow stay "open" over-night or is the opening price just some arbitrary figure that some expert decides it's worth the next morning?

There is such a thing called after hours trading. I've never done it and only heard from non-experts.

As I understand it, it has several risks. I don't think there is a central "ticker" to track global bid/ask prices. There is no instant cash out option. There was something about delays/timing and not getting the order executed at the exact time and price like you would in regular hours.

I defer to those with more knowledge.

There is both an after-hours session and a pre-market session, and neither is particularly risky IMO. You would not want to put in a "market" order for a stock because the extended session quotes are estimates, but there's no problem or risk in putting in a limit order to buy or sell. The order either is or isn't filled at that price, just as in the standard market hours.

I've kept this question on the back burner and read an article this morning mentioning that the SEC defines a penny stock as having a price between $1.50 and $5.00. LOL, please don't ask which article because I've probably gone through a hundred so far today<g>.

FWIW, somewhere along the way, some other articles mentioned that Las Vegas strip revenue was down 28% in October 2008, but one of those articles also said that figure might be a little extreme since October 2007 was a record high month. This info came from one of the articles I read on MGM-Mirage.

Thanks for that info, ya'll!!! Today's close was $42.21 a share for Wynn and $4.62 for Boyd. (Dec 30, 2008)

By every definition I've ever heard, that makes Boyd a penny stock..... I know nothing about the stock market but I figure Boyd Gaming will climb over $20 a share late next year. And even more if and when they ever get there new project off the ground

I'm just not confident enough to purchase a thousand shares!

Latest great offer was from the Golden Nuggat - $99 for three midweek evenings.

Palms offered $109 per mid week night. But you also receive compt admission for two to the Playboy Club, $50 food credit, $30 Spa credit, $25 gaming credit, plus an upgrade to a Palms Place Studio unit for $50 extra.

They really do treat you right at the Palms from my past experiences.

Las Vegas is doing better than Reno.

Reno cancelled it's fireworks show because they can't afford/justify it.