This is getting predictable. In May, casino revenues in Atlantic City declined 9% from May 2009. Year to date, revenues are down 7.9%, and it doesn’t look to get much better. I don’t think that table games in Delaware and Pennsylvania are going to help.
It was an across-the-board decline. Every casino posted lower revenues that the year before. Here is the ranked list, with monthly revenues and the overall gaming win change from the year before:
Showboat $26,595,345 (6.7)
Trump Plaza $17,343,916 (6.8)
Bally’s $40,039,889 (7.7)
Harrah’s $39,651,738 (8.9)
TOTAL INDUSTRY: $319,664,282 (9.0)
Trump Taj Mahal $34,869,564 (9.3)
Tropicana $25,256,670 (9.5)
Trump Marina $13,035,877 (10.9)
Caesars $35,381,509 (11.5)
Resorts $14,422,429 (12.8)
AC Hilton $13,871,734 (20.9)
You can get a sense of the (relative) winners and losers here. Borgata’s clearly the top of the market, while Harrah’s is weathering the storm fairly well: three of their four properties declined less than the industry average. Trump, whose Plaza did surprisingly un-bad, is in the next tier, along with the Tropicana, followed the present and former Colony Capital properties at the bottom. Resorts, in a complete shock, actually increased its table game revenues, but since they were already pretty anemic (2nd-lowest in the market), it’s hard to say whether this was because of volatility or a real increase in demand. Judging from the slot performance (nearly a 20% decline), it’s the former, but it’s impossible to say for sure.
No bones about it, this was another bad month for Atlantic City. There’s something of a silver lining for Borgata and the Harrah’s properties (though Caesars should be doing better), but not much solace for anyone else.
Year to date, Harrah’s, Caesars, and Showboat are doing the best (Harrah’s revenues are actually up .5%), followed by Borgata, then the Trop and Bally’s–these casinos are all seeing their revenues drop less than the industry average (7.9%). Below that line, you’ve got the Trump casinos in a solid blocks (YTD declines of 10-15%), followed by Resorts (16%), with the Hilton in freefall (more than 20% decline in revenues).
Two things are going to happen: either the market will miraculously turn around, or someone’s going to close. Those casinos at the bottom can’t continue to see revenue declines like this and keep their doors open.