“You can gamble anywhere. What is an absolutely essential ingredient in gambling is great food. We focus on that. Casino gambling has become a destination rather than just a place.”
—Larry Flynt, owner of the Lucky Lady Casino in Gardena, California, upon its grand reopening
“Really nothing has materially changed in terms of the demographic profile who is visiting our properties. It’s still 60 percent of our revenues come from customers between the ages of early 50s to early 70s, the heart of the baby boomers and that hasn’t changed much.”
—Tim Wilmott, president and chief executive officer of Penn National Gaming
“While New Hampshire has done nothing, surrounding states now have gaming entities,” he said. “They advertise on our TV stations and we send buses of New Hampshire residents to those other states to gamble. It’s time for New Hampshire to do something. No state that has done this has crumbled.”
—New Hampshire state Senator Lou D’Allesandro, promoting his bill that would authorize two casinos in the Granite State
“Like I said, we are friendly, we are offering a level playing field in terms of business investments, we are a very safe country, and we have a lovely people and an open society that knows nothing about discrimination. I think this will all work together because we have a very strong president who does what he preaches and makes good on his promises.”
—Andrea Domingo, chairwoman, Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp., talking up the business environment under Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte
“Online and land-based gambling have different overhead and margins. Even the assumption that online and live gamblers are cut from the same cloth were true (it’s not, and here’s why), the notion that casinos would disregard land-based operations in favor of online simply doesn’t pass the smell test.”
—Column on USPoker.com website disputing claims by Pennsylvania senators at a March 8 joint Assembly hearing that the 15 percent tax proposed for online casino would give them an unfair advantage over land-based casinos that pay a 59 percent tax
“We get zero. We have the only casino industry in the world that charges zero on gross gaming revenue taxes.”
—Edwin Probst, Saipan lawmaker, on Imperial Pacific International’s operations in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands
“Two weeks is short for analyzing a case of this dimension. This will be a complex and lengthy trial.”
—Oriana Inácio Pun, defense attorney for Ho Chio Meng, former Macau chief prosecutor accused of more than 1,500 crimes including money laundering and aggravated fraud
“Any expectation of 30 percent to 40 percent of revenue from Chinese tourism is unrealistic.”
—David Edwards, Queensland CEO of State Development, in a frank appraisal of a potential Cairns casino development
