NEWS & NOTES

Wynn Resorts Ltd. CEO Matt Maddox has cashed out nearly 56,000 shares of his company, worth around $6.3 million, after its share price climbed by more than 150 percent over the past nine months. The share dump, accomplished in three transactions, was accomplished for standard tax purposes, “consistent with what many executives do when their company’s trading window opens,” Wynn spokesman Michael Weaver told the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Maddox has 394,549 shares remaining. • Online gaming supplier Gaming Realms has receive a provisional iGaming supplier license from the Michigan Gaming Control Board, enabling it to provide its Slingo Originals game content to casino operators as Michigan rolls out its nascent online gaming market this year. While Governor Gretchen Whitmer signed online gaming and sport betting into law in 2019, rollout has been delayed by the Covid-19 pandemic. • Bids in a charity auction to push the button to implode the former Trump Plaza in Atlantic City were holding at $175,000 as of last Monday, reported the Press of Atlantic City. The demolition of the structure of Trump Plaza, closed in 2014, represents removal of the last remnant of President Trump’s former Atlantic City empire. Proceeds of the auction go the Boys & Girls Club of Atlantic City. • Bermuda will get its first casino in 2021, according to Premier David Burt, who said the island’s banks had been the only block to the gambling industry for more than six years after the legislation was approved. But he said problems have been overcome and that the industry could get off the ground. “I am expecting certainly that we’ll have a casino, at least one casino, operating in Bermuda this year and we’ll continue to work on that,” Burt told The Royal Gazette. ● Westgate Las Vegas resident headliner Barry Manilow has postponed concerts set for February, March and May. Manilow’s The Hits Come Home show in the International Theater at Westgate will resume on June 10. Michael Bublé’s concert tour stop at T-Mobile Arena on the Las Vegas Strip was also rescheduled from February 12 to September 24. A sold-out Garth Brooks concert at Allegiant Stadium is still scheduled for February 27 after being pushed back from August 2020. ● After bankrolling two disaster evacuation centers in Albay in December, the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp. (PAGCOR), that country’s gaming regulator, has approved four more such facilities in the Bicol Region. PAGCOR President and COO Alfredo Lim said locals living in typhoon-prone communities need a safe place to shelter when the storms hit. PAGCOR’s project provides “safe, sturdy and comfortable shelter to our less privileged.” ● The number of young people self-excluding from gambling in Lithuania declined in 2020, but rates increased for women and people aged 31-40, according to the Lithuanian Gambling Supervisory Authority. In total, 17,348 people excluded themselves from gambling in 2020. For the first time since data was first collected in 2017, the percentage of self-excluded gamblers from 18 to 20 declined, from 9 percent to 6 percent. ● After 16 years at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas, celebrity chef Hubert Keller is severing his ties with two local restaurants: Fleur and Mandalay Place’s Burger Bar. Both restaurants are closed for now due to Covid-19. According to MGM Resorts International, the restaurants will reopen in some form, with “details to be shared in the months ahead. MGM Resorts looks forward to continuing to create special dining experiences for its visitors from around the world.” ● New Zealand sports betting operator TAB NZ has launched a campaign urging customers in the jurisdiction to avoid gambling with offshore operators. A series of short video advertisements on TAB Trackside Television will feature celebrities including rugby union player Stephen Donald, horse trainer Jamie Richards, UFC fighter Dan Hooker and jockeys Samantha Collett and Sheree Tomlinson. An estimated NZ$130 million (US$94.4 million) of gross betting revenue is lost offshore, TAB NZ says. ● Holland Casino in the Netherlands has agreed to a new collective labor agreement with trade unions De Unie and FNV. The agreement, to run through May 2022, includes a structural wage increase of 1.5 percent that takes effect in October. A one-off payment of 0.75 percent will take place in March 2022. Danielle Justus, director of human resources at Holland Casino, said, “All parties took joint responsibility for the future of Holland Casino and its employees in these extremely uncertain and difficult times. We have also succeeded in reaching agreements with each other on a form of voluntary severance scheme and a placement scheme. Both are important in the context of our necessary restructuring and will certainly contribute to fewer forced redundancies.” ● Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie will be a regular contributor on radio host Craig Carton’s new weekend show focused on gambling addiction and responsible gaming, according to a press release. The program is broadcast on AM and FM frequencies in the New York market. Along with Christie, it will feature “various guests to share stories of indulgence, falls from grace and the fight to overcome gambling addiction. Guests will include medical and therapy experts, members of the 1-800-GAMBLER team, founders of rehabilitation treatment centers, and more.” The show is sponsored by the Council on Compulsive Gambling of New Jersey. ● Dutch Gaming Authority Kansspelautoriteit has imposed fines totaling €600,000 (US$734,952) on gaming operators who offered illegal online games of chance. Virtual Coin Gaming NV of Curaçao offered the games on two websites and has been fined €500,000. An unnamed individual has been fined €100,000. Online games of chance are prohibited in the country. ● Some healthcare facilities in the Navajo Nation have started providing Covid-19 vaccines to elderly patients. The total number of deaths in the Nation held at 871 as of January 10. Reports indicate that 12,855 individuals have recovered from Covid-19, and 216,357 Covid-19 tests have been administered. The total number of positive Covid-19 cases is now 25,383. ● The border district of Mae Sot in western Thailand is preparing for a large number of Thais working in a casino in Myawaddy to flee the coronavirus in Myanmar. In a recent group of 40 Thai returnees, 17 tested positive. All of them worked for the Sky Complex casino. ● Caesars Windsor in Ontario, Canada, and Unifor Local 444, the union that represents have extended their existing collective agreement for a year. According to the union: “In this Covid climate with so much uncertainty , lockdowns, opening and capacity limits, it made sense amongst your leadership and with a mutual agreement with the employer to exercise our option to extend the existing agreement for 12 months.” Many of the casino’s 2,100 employees have been laid off since March. • Super Bowl favorites among America’s sportsbooks are the Kansas City Chiefs for the AFC and the Green Bay Packers for the NFC. William Hill gives + 150 to win the championship, with +240 at BetMGM. The Packers are +450 at PointsBet and +500 at William Hill. • Tioga Downs Resort and Casino in Nichols, New York, has announced it will lay off 68 employees in March due to restrictions from the Covid-19 pandemic. It has furloughed employees since March but this is the first time some of them have been terminated. The casino has been operated since September with limited services. • Mohegan Sun in Connecticut has postponed its annual Sun WineFest this year due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The postponement was announced on its website: “Unfortunately the concerns with Covid-19 and keeping our community safe takes precedence. We will miss you this year, but can’t wait to celebrate our 18th anniversary in 2022.” The 20-year-old festival last January attracted about 10,000 guests. ● The Silver Legacy Resort Casino in Reno, Nevada, expects to complete a $47 million upgrade of its 1,199 rooms and suites by the summer, parent company Caesars Entertainment said. The renovations cap $100 million worth of improvements to the Silver Legacy and its sister properties in the city’s downtown casino district, the Eldorado and Circus Circus Reno. ● The Nüwa hotel at Macau’s City of Dreams casino will reopen February 8 following extensive renovations and the addition of new amenities. The upgraded facility will feature some 300 rooms and suites, including 33 luxury villas, a high-end spa and salon and a Michelin three-starred Cantonese restaurant. ● Allied Esports and HyperX have renewed their exclusive naming rights for the HyperX Esports Arena Las Vegas at the Luxor Hotel and Casino on the Las Vegas Strip. The new multi-year agreement calls for HyperX to continue to receive prominent branding and signage inside and outside the venue as well as across all arena promotions, content and social media platforms. HyperX and Allied Esports also will continue to partner on a variety of co-branded experiences and events. The arena, which has hosted more than 500 events since opening in 2018, drew more than 300,000 visitors in 2019.