This suitor won’t be spurned
Boston-based investment firm Esplanade Capital has made another bid to acquire Archon Corp., a Nevada casino company owned by Paul and Sue Lowden. Sue Lowden is a former Nevada state senator and a current GOP lieutenant gubernatorial candidate, reports the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
In the past 15 months, Esplanade has made three attempts to buy the company, upping the ante from an offer of $17.50 per share last April to $18.50 per share in May, and finally, $19.25 per share this month. The Lowdens, who control about 90 percent of Archon, have repeatedly informed Esplanade that it is not interested. But the company is not easily dissuaded.
In a statement, Esplanade Capital President Shawn Kravetz declared that the latest offer represents a 61.6 percent premium based on Archon’s historic closing prices. Esplanade claims to be the second-largest shareholder in Archon.
“Despite our repeated attempts to reach out to the company, the board of directors refused to meet with us,” Kravetz wrote. “Notwithstanding your stonewalling, we remain extremely committed to pursuing a negotiated transaction to acquire all of the outstanding shares of the company.”
Archon owns one casino, the 400-room, Western-themed Pioneer Club in Laughlin, Nevada. Archon also owns office buildings in Maryland and suburban Boston, the Review-Journal reported.
Last year, Archon Chairman Paul Lowden said the family “has no intentions” of selling the company, which was created after his former company sold the defunct Sahara to the late William Bennett, and also sold the Santa Fe in northwest Las Vegas to Station Casinos.
