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Poker News Digest 10/8/2008 – 10/10/2008
By Dan
Published: Friday, October 10, 2008
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- Lasseters Corporation Limited has closed its two online casinos, AusVegas Online Casino and Lasseters Online Casino. The closures are effective Friday, October 3. In a post on Lasseters’ website, Operating Officer Brian Gordon explained that “…the Directors have taken the subsequent decision to cease the operations of Lasseters Online Casino due to our inability to compete and retain our market share since the closure of the US market in October 2006.” Fortunately, the company is still allowing players to login and request cashouts, so customer deposits do appear to be readily available. Players must submit withdrawal requests by October 24. Those with balances lower than $25 must submit a request via e-mail to support@ausvegas.com.au. Personal identification will be required for all cashouts, if not previously submitted.
- The Nevada Gaming Control Board published its monthly revenue report this week, once again revealing very poor results across most of the state for the month of August. Revenues from Las Vegas Strip properties were down 7.43 percent to $494 million compared to the same period last year, while downtown locations did even worse, with revenues decreasing 9.53 percent to $43 million month over month. Mesquite, home to the Stateline and Eureka casinos, got pummeled last month, seeing its gambling revenues plummet 32.42 percent, but rebounded in August with the lone positive result in the state, a 2.11 percent revenue increase to $10.8 million. The state as a whole had its August gambling revenues fall 8 percent, the eighth straight month that gambling revenues fell, reflecting the troubled world economy. On the bright side, this was an improvement from the 12.97 percent drop from in July.
- Lakes Entertainment, the majority shareholder of World Poker Tour Enterprises, Inc. (WPTE), announced this week that it will essentially be giving away all of its shares of the beleaguered poker entertainment company. Lakes, which owns 61 percent of WPTE’s outstanding common shares, will distribute all 12.48 million of them as a special dividend to its own shareholders. Timothy Cope, President and CFO of Lakes Entertainment, said this will allow Lakes to provide its shareholders with “greater transparency” of the company’s financials and operations, as it will no longer have to consolidate WPTE’s figures with those of Lakes. He added that this will give Lakes shareholders the opportunity to “monetize” their new WPTE shares. In reality, the motivation for the special dividend is likely the fact that WPTE is struggling to stay alive. On Friday, shares of WPTE closed at a meager 52 cents, just three days after hitting an all-time low of 41 cents. On August 14, the company was issued a NASDAQ Staff Determination Letter which said that WPTE was not in compliance with the exchange’s minimum price requirements, as its share price had been below one dollar for 30 consecutive days. The company was given 180 days to get the price back up over that mark, where it must remain for at least 10 consecutive days, or the stock may be delisted. WPTE shares did close at or above one dollar for two non-consecutive days in early September, but the way the economy looks right now, things do not look promising for the company.
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