Downtown Vegas Continues To Outperform The Strip In July

With revenue in the world’s largest gaming destination, Macau, China, continuing to slump, casino investors have been looking to the state of Nevada for some much-needed good news this year. The state's Gaming Control Board recently released its report on gaming revenue for the month of July. Here’s a summary of the report.

The Numbers

Nevada’s non-restricted gaming licensees reported a total “gaming win” of $922,886,804 in July, a 0.96 percent year-over-year decrease. July marks the beginning of the new fiscal year for Nevada, after statewide gaming revenue declined by 1.5 percent last fiscal year.

Related Link: Is Macau Coming Back?

Las Vegas Strip

More than $524 million (about 57 percent) of Nevada’s total gaming win in July came from the Las Vegas Strip. Shareholders of strip mega-resort operators Wynn Resorts, Limited WYNN, Las Vegas Sands Corp. LVS, MGM Resorts International MGM and Caesars Entertainment Corp CZR are watching Strip numbers closely.

Win numbers for the Vegas Strip were down 2.09 percent year-over-year (Y/Y), an improvement over June’s 16.31 percent decline. Last fiscal year’s totals for the Strip were the worst of any gaming area in the state, lagging Nevada’s overall numbers and falling short of the previous fiscal year’s total by 4.30 percent.

Downtown Vegas

While the Vegas Strip continues to struggle, historic Downtown Las Vegas’ numbers once again come in relatively strong. Last fiscal year’s numbers for Downtown Vegas climbed 3.09 percent Y/Y, and July’s total gaming win for downtown was $40,800,145 – a 6.54 percent increase from last July’s numbers.

Shares of Boyd Gaming Corporation BYD, which operates three downtown casinos, are up 2.8 percent on Friday following the latest numbers out of Vegas and have climbed 54.7 percent in the past year.