Las Vegas Strip Revenue Up 7.8% In March

With Macau’s gaming recovery really starting to gain momentum, Las Vegas is off to a solid start to 2017 as well.

On Wednesday, The Nevada state gaming control board has released its report on gaming revenue for the Las Vegas area in the month of March. Here's a brief overview.

The Numbers

Nevada's non-restricted gaming licensees reported a total taxable revenue of $1.006 billion in March, a 7.0 percent year-over-year increase.

Statewide revenue is now up 2.4 percent year-to-date.

Las Vegas Strip

More than $543 million (about 54 percent) of Nevada's statewide gaming revenue in March came from the Las Vegas Strip.

Shareholders of strip mega-resort operators Wynn Resorts, Limited WYNN, Las Vegas Sands Corp. LVS and MGM Resorts International MGM are watching Strip numbers closely.

Taxable revenue for the Vegas Strip was up 7.8 percent year-over-year in March and is now up 2.0 percent year-to-date.

Related Link: Betting On Wynn Resorts To Keep Gaining Market Share, Union Gaming Upgrades

Downtown Vegas

Historic Downtown Las Vegas, which has performed extremely well in recent months, followed a solid February with a huge 18.4 percent taxable revenue gain in March.

So far in 2017, Downtown Vegas taxable revenue is up 14.1 percent, the strongest growth number of any region in the state.

Shares of Boyd Gaming Corporation BYD, which operates three downtown casinos, are up 22.9 percent in the past six months. Nevada pure-play Red Rock Resorts Inc RRR is up 4.1 percent in that time.

Next Catalyst

After multiple analyst upgrades and positive preliminary data out of Macau, shares of Macau operators Las Vegas Sands, MGM, Wynn and Melco Resorts & Entertainment Ltd(ADR) MLCO have been on fire in April. The stocks are all up between 4 and 17 percent on the month. The next major driver for these four gaming stocks will be coming on May 1 when Macau reports gross gaming revenue totals for the month of April.

Disclosure: the author is long MLCO.