The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has given its OK to Caesars Entertainment’s $516.3 million sale of the Rio casino hotel in Las Vegas to a New York-based real estate group.
“The Federal Trade Commission has determined there are no anti-trust issues with the Rio sale,” a spokeswoman for Caesars said.
Caesars hopes to close the sale by the end of the year, pending shareholder and regulatory approval.
The buyer is one of the principals of Imperial Companies, headquartered in Manhattan, a real estate investment, development and management fund focused on mixed-use, residential and hospitality properties nationwide. Caesars will continue to operate the Rio under a multiyear lease of $45 million annually.
Caesars is involved in several other casino sales, mainly to its spinoff REIT, VICI Properties, as it prepares to be acquired by regional gaming giant Eldorado Resorts in a $17.3 billion cash, stock and debt transaction expected to close in the first half of 2020.
The 2,500-room Rio, located on Flamingo Road west of the Las Vegas Strip, opened under private ownership in January 1990 as a tropical-themed destination whose mix of high-end restaurants and adult-focused gambling and non-gambling entertainment exercised a significant influence on much of the Strip megaresort development that followed.
Caesars’ predecessor Harrah’s Entertainment acquired it in 1998 for $880 million in stock and assumed debt. Later, when Caesars bought the World Series of Poker, it sent the tournament there to boost the property’s then-fading fortunes. It’s expected the tournament will remain there for next year but will be moved after that, possibly to the $375 million Caesars Forum, a 550,000-square-foot conference and events center under construction behind the company’s Linq resort complex on the Strip.
