Someone else wants to buy Aztar. From Reuters:
Casino operator Aztar Corp., which has been the target of a bidding war, said on Monday that it had received a buyout offer worth more than $1.69 billion from Columbia Entertainment and would enter into talks with the company.
Aztar said Columbia Entertainment, the gaming affiliate of hotel owner Columbia Sussex Corp., had offered it $47 per share in cash, marking a 9 percent increase from the highest previous offer of $1.54 billion by Ameristar Casinos Inc.
Both offers include additional payment for preferred shares.
We got Aztar’s 2005 annual report on Friday. Usually these things are works of art–Ameristar had a really flashy one last year. Aztar’s is just a Courier-font printout of its Form 10-K bound in a glossy cover. Kind of depressing.
The big news here is that Red Rock Station is opening. It’s everywhere. Well, the casino itself is in Summerlin, but the hype is everywhere. I’ll be there, and I might even post a picture of the carpet that night, like I did with Wynn Las Vegas–truly the crowning moment of my professional career (self-deprecating sarcasm alert!).
Speaking of gaming companies, I’m still busy working on the section of the Gaming Abstract dealing with gaming corporations. I’m currently trying to parse MTR Gaming’s corporate history into an accurate but easy to understand timeline. It’s harder than you might think.