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Caesars Interactive Entertainment Could Be for Sale, But Will Bankruptcy Court Allow It?

Sun jie — Fri, 06 Mar 2020 09:21:37 +0000

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Caesars Interactive is being courted for a $4 billion takeover but a deal is not simply plain sailing for its embattled parent.

Caesars Entertainment is considering the sale of its digital division, Caesars Interactive Entertainment (CIE), according to Bloomberg Technologies.

Anonymous sources told Bloomberg Friday that the embattled casino giant had received multiple offers that would value the company at $4 billion. Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal understands that Caesars has hired investment bank Raine Group LLC to evaluate the bids.

CIE CEO Mitch Garber, told WJS that there was no formal sales process and the offers may well lead to nothing, but he added, ‘We want to hear what people have to say, for sure.’

CIE has been the silver lining for Caesars, a company mired in industry-high debt and bankruptcy proceedings. It’s the only Caesars unit currently turning a profit and has come to dominate the social casino games market, thanks to the success of its Playtika mobile brand and games suites like Slotomania and Bingo Blitz.

$18 Billion Bankruptcy Case

It owns the profitable World Series of Poker, as well as WSOP.com, which offers real-money gaming in Nevada and New Jersey, although its social gaming business far outstrips its real-money ventures. Last year the company brought in revenues of $766.5 million and earnings of $282.7 million.

It might be tempting for a company with roughly $20 billion in debt to make a sale. A windfall of $4 billion might take some of the pressure off Caesars’ other units whose potential profitability is stymied by crippling repayments.

But it may not be quite that simple.

Caesars is trying to reorganize $18.4 billion of its debt load by putting its chief operating unit, Caesars Entertainment Operating Corp (CEOC), through chapter 11 bankruptcy.

But it is also being sued by CEOC’s lower tier creditors who accuse its reorganization plans of favoring the interests of its controlling private equity backers over theirs.

CIE Part of ‘Asset-Stripping’ Claims

Moreover, they accuse Caesars of fraudulently transferring valuable assets from CEOC to other operating units, leaving CEOC holding all the debt and with no means to repay it.

A recent court examiner’s report sided with the creditors and stated that potential damages for their claims could range from $3.6 billion to $5.1 billion.

The creditors allege that CEI is one of the assets transferred out of their grasp, which would make any deal for its sale extremely difficult while the legal action is unresolved.

For all its untainted success over the past few years, CEI could well find itself sucked into its parent’s messy bankruptcy proceedings, one way or another.

Draftstars Wants to Grab Australian DFS Audience, Hoping to Piggyback on Aussies’ Love of Sports Betting

Australian daily fantasy sports site Draftstars, a joint venture between online bookmaker CrownBet and sports channel conglomerate Fox Sports, recently announced that the new platform is undergoing a promotional marketing drive to tap into the emerging Aussie demographic.

Bringing DFS Down Under: Australia will be the target of a daily fantasy sports marketing onslaught with Draftstars, a new platform hoping to capitalize on the potentially highly lucrative fantasy sports market. (Image: FOX Sports)

Hosted by the turnkey daily fantasy software company DraftDay, Draftstars was launched in early 2016 and currently offers contests on the National Basketball Association (NBA) and Australian Football League (AFL). The site touts itself as the ‘Official Daily Fantasy Sports Partner of the ALF.’

Marketing to the Masses

This week, Draftstars said it is initiating a multichannel advertising push to grow its brand awareness through television, radio, digital, and social media.

‘We are confident we have the right marketing strategy,’ Draftstars CEO Matt Sanders told eGaming Review. According to Sanders, the goal of the PR blitz is to ‘educate Australian sports fans on what an exciting and engaging experience daily fantasy sports is.’

Draftstars is open to legal residents of Australia and New Zealand who are at least 18 years old. Though the Interactive Gambling Act passed by the Australian Parliament in 2001 banned Aussie-based companies from offering online gambling, DFS is (for now, at least) exempt, as there is a sports-betting carveout, under which umbrella daily fantasy now falls. The site is regulated by Australia’s Northern Territory.

Down Under with DFS

DFS, of course, has been wildly popular in the United States with FanDuel and DraftKings since the two market leaders respectively commenced operations in 2009 and 2012. The leading cause for the DFS rise in America is due to the federal ban on sports betting outside of Nevada, combined with a long history of office pool fantasy betting across the country.

Daily fantasy contests provide fans an alterative way to add excitement to watching sports.

Conversely, DFS hasn’t taken off the same way in other countries, due to the fact that sports betting is not only legal, but cherished. That’s certainly the case in Australia, where placing a wager on Australian football, cricket, and rugby is a national pastime for ‘punters.’

However, recent steps by parliament to restrict in-play betting and a potential revamping of online gaming laws has some companies preparing for new regulations and perhaps a loophole by way of DFS.

What’s in a Name?

The DFS market is quickly becoming crowded with a host of platforms that all sound and look alike.

Ready for a tongue twister?

With DraftKings, DraftDay, FantasyDraft, Draftpot, Draft Ops, AlphaDraft, and PokerStars’ StarsDraft, Draftstars is just the latest DFS provider in a long list of companies trying to capitalize off the ‘draft’ terminology.

According to the Australian Government, Aussies spent $19 billion on gambling in 2008-09, and during that same year, roughly 70 percent of all citizens participated in some form of gambling.

Las Vegas Culinary Union 226 Implies Jim Crow Laws Being Used in Red Rock and Station Casinos Dispute

Las Vegas Culinary Union Local 226 says the actions of the Clark County District Attorney’s office in relation to the distribution of flyers by two of the union’s Hispanic members inside the Red Rock Resort late last year are so egregious, they are reminiscent of the ‘Jim Crow’ laws enacted in the South after the Civil War to enforce racial segregation.

Culinary Union 226 members, seen here protesting in February outside Palace Station in Las Vegas, are fighting back against criminal charges from Station Casinos, stemming from distributing materials inside the Red Rock Resort last December. (Image: unitehere.org)

As reported by the Las Vegas Review-Journal’s David Ferrara this week (and oddly not covered by any other local Las Vegas news outlets that we could discern, including going unmentioned on the union’s own website at the time of this writing), on December 15, 2015, two union representatives surreptitiously entered the five-star Red Rock Casino Resort & Spa’s guest room floors. There they allegedly circulated flyers under customers’ doors that decried the actions of the hotel’s parent company, Station Casinos.

According to items reportedly obtained by Ferrara, the flyers warned guests that ‘Station Casinos, the owner of Red Rock Resort, is the worst labor law breaker in Nevada gaming.’

Las Vegas Metro Police Department cited the two infiltrators that evening, after hotel security took the pair to its offices and handcuffed them.

But this is no simple trespassing case.

Vegas Vagrants?

Instead of filing only misdemeanor trespassing charges against the two, prosecutors for Clark County District Attorney Steven Wolfson added ‘vagrancy’ to the allegations. That led defense attorneys for the union to question whether the district attorney’s office was working for the people of Clark County, or for Station Casinos, said Ferrara.

‘This amended complaint . . . resurrects the Jim Crow vagrancy laws of a segregated and bigoted United States,’ union defense attorney Tom Pitaro wrote in legal documents that Ferrara apparently had access to.

Jim Crow laws refer to the ‘separate but equal’ segregation policies that were enforced following the United States’ Reconstruction period in the post-Civil War era in the South, which continued to be enforced until 1965. ‘Vagrancy’ was one criminal charge levied on many people of color for any number of vague transgressions, and has since been ruled largely unconstitutional by the US Supreme Court for its lack of clarity as to what, in fact, can be considered ‘vagrant’ behavior.

Prosecutions for such charges must now be tied to specific and observable acts, meaning that security camera footage of the two union members putting flyers under doors would likely fill the bill.

But in general, Las Vegas hotels do not put security cameras in guest hallways, reserving them instead for watching where their money goes in casinos. This practice has been called up as unsafe by hotel guests in Sin City in the past, but whether Red Rock has installed such cameras, which might support its vagrancy case, remains unclear.

State of the Union

Union lawyer Pitaro is no stranger to controversial high-profile cases. Practicing law in Las Vegas for more than 40 years, he gained national notoriety for representing O.J. Simpson in 2013.

And like the case against Simpson, the Culinary Union defense will certainly be challenging for the experienced attorney.

That’s because the duo doesn’t seem to have much legal foothold to disseminate union materials in the hotel, let alone on guest room floors.

A common defense against trespassing and vagrancy is claiming the defendant was exercising their First Amendment rights, but the First Amendment generally doesn’t apply to private property, which Red Rock Resorts is. A claim could even be made that guests might have felt threatened by the flyers, although there is no evidence one way or the other on whether this has been mentioned by any customers.

Casinos Call the Shots

Las Vegas has designated areas where citizens, groups, and unions can petition locals into backing their causes. However, regardless of merit, a group cannot freely walk into a private property to summon support without prior consent from the ownership.

That’s because casinos, not unions, possess the right to dictate who enters their premises.

Nonetheless, the Culinary Union argues that Station Casinos is engaged in an aggressive anti-union campaign.

‘Many of us have devoted over half of our lives working at Station Casinos,’ a Culinary Union pamphlet states. ‘We demand that Station Casinos Ownership and Management . . . agree to a fair process for us to decide whether to have union representation without management interference and intimidation.’

Station Casino employees are currently non-union, something the Culinary Union hopes to change.

Pennsylvania Online Gambling Legislation Poised for Budget Inclusion

State Rep. John Payne’s Pennsylvania online gambling bill might finally become law, one potential positive of the state’s https://myfreepokies.com/silver-oak/ mammoth budget shortfall. (Image: abc27.com)

Pennsylvania online gambling is being heralded as a potential saving grace for state lawmakers in Harrisburg looking to overcome a $1.8 billion budget deficit. While some in the state capital are advocating for a sales or income tax increase, House Republicans are looking to Internet casinos as one possible solution to bridge the gap.

‘It’s definitely on the table,’ Stephen Miskin, press secretary to State House Majority Leader Dave Reed (R-District 62), told LancasterOnline.com.

The State House and Senate are currently battling over the 2016-17 fiscal budget and determining the best way to increase spending per Governor Tom Wolf’s (D) plans.

Growing Paynes

The iGambling bill at question is State Rep. John Payne’s (R-District 106) HB 649, legislation that would overhaul the state’s current gambling laws to allow for the inclusion of Internet casinos.

HB 649 would license each Internet operator at a one-time cost of $8 million, plus an additional one-time $2 million fee to fund problem gambling initiatives. Licenses would be renewed to companies in good standing at an annual cost of $250,000.

Online casino companies would additionally pay a 14 percent tax on daily gross revenues.

Though the tariffs might seem exorbitant at first glance, it’s important to remember that Pennsylvania has some of the country’s highest tax rates on land-based casinos. The state has an effective tax rate of 55 percent on the commonwealth’s 13 brick-and-mortar casinos.

First introduced in February of 2015, Payne’s bill hasn’t made much progress outside the House Gaming Oversight Committee in which he chairs. Last November, the committee voted 18-8 in favor of HB 649, but the statute has since dragged its feet in the House chamber.

Ritz Club Sues Tycoon Safa Abdulla Al Geabury Over £2 million Gambling Financial Obligation.

Sun jie — Fri, 06 Mar 2020 08:34:40 +0000

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Safa Abdulla Al Geabury, whose £2 million dud check bounced when Ritz staff attempted to cash it the day after their gambling spree.

The Ritz Club, London’s famously high-end, high-roller casino, is suing a property that is swiss over a £2 million ($3.1 million) bounced check.

In line with the Ritz’s filing, Safa Abdulla Al Geabury wrote away the check to invest in a gambling session one night in February last year, but it turned into a dud once the casino tried to bank it the following morning.

The Ritz can also be seeking an extra £200,000 ($310,000) in accumulated interest on the debt.

It’s been reported that the casino, that will be owned by reclusive billionaire identical twins, Sir David and Sir Frederick Barclay, has been plunged to the red by a show of unpaid gambling debts, forcing it to pursue its debtors aggressively in the courts.

According to the London Evening Standard, the casino has litigated against 10 high rollers within the year that is last in order to recoup 2013 losings of £12.5 million ($19.4 million).

Al-Daher Case

Al Geabury’s protection is that he is a gambling addict and his staff must have known this and stopped him from playing.

He wants the debts written off, but he is on shaky ground with this line; in 2014 the casino won a similar High Court battle against Noora Al-Daher, the spouse of the Omani foreign minister.

The Ritz sued Al-Daher after she had visited the casino in April 2012 and proceeded to lose £2 million ($3.3 million) in a few hours. Al-Daher failed to honor £1 million ($1.65) of her debt. She promptly counter-sued the casino, claiming that the casino had taken advantage of her.

Al-Daher had reported in court that Ritz Club employees encouraged her to continue playing a game title of chemin-de-fer, despite having been made aware of her gambling addiction, and also allowed her to cash checks, which she claimed was illegal.

She also said that the casino had been under a ‘duty of care’ towards her, a responsibility which it had failed to meet.

Psychiatric Reports

However, the court heard that Al-Daher and her family had apparently happily gambled away $5 million in Las Vegas a months that are few her see to the Ritz.

In ruling in favor of the casino, the judge stated he was specific that, had Al-Daher been refused authorization to carry on gambling at the Ritz, she ‘would have been eager and inclined to gamble at other casinos thereafter, and very most likely during her remain in London through the days or weeks after 3 April 2012.’

The judge in the Al Geabury situation, Mrs Justice Simler, meanwhile, said at a hearing that is preliminary psychiatric reports have been commissioned to assess Al Geabury’s frame of mind on the day he lost the cash and whether he was in control of his actions.

‘The essence is whether Mr Al Geabury has a gambling addiction as well as the claimant’s knowledge of that,’ she stated.

Carl Icahn Awarded Trump Taj Mahal as Battle with Union Continues

Carl Icahn wishes to revitalize the Taj Mahal in Atlantic City and save thousands of jobs along the way, but it is said by him can not be done unless regional union employees are prepared to compromise. Unhappy union workers, shown right here at an early on protest, feel otherwise. (Image: Wayne Perry/AP File)

Billionaire Carl Icahn has acquired the Trump Taj Mahal, exchanging $292 million he’s owed for complete ownership of this casino in a deal which was approved by the brand new Jersey Casino Control Commission this week.

Icahn claims he will invest another $100 million to revitalize the resort and to keep the Atlantic City landmark solvent.

‘We think when you pull into the Taj Mahal, it’s dirty, it’s dated, and it needs to be freshened up,’ Trump Entertainment CEO Robert Griffin said of the settlement. ‘I feel very highly that the Taj Mahal can do well.’

That will be no task that is easy however, since the north end boardwalk gambling venue continues to use at a loss, including being $8.7 million at a negative balance for the initial quarter of 2015. The resort’s 2,010 rooms had been less than 50 percent complete during the first 3 months regarding the 12 months, a drastically reduced rate than that of the other seven casino resort hotels that averaged occupancy levels of around 70 to 85 percent.

Icahn’t Stand Unions

Icahn is optimistic that he can restore the Taj to its former days of glory. But one condition that is key mogul insists on is the fact that Local 54 while the UNITE HERE unions stop their pursuit of experiencing a court mandate Icahn to reinstate benefits for workers which were terminated by Trump Entertainment during bankruptcy proceedings.

On Wednesday, Icahn told reporters he sees the Taj being reestablished much like he did using the Tropicana, the other Atlantic City casino under his ownership.

‘Although regional 54 seems fixated at all costs on damaging the Taj, and risking its closure and the increasing loss of almost 3,000 jobs, I am optimistic,’ Icahn said.

Icahn also released a page to regional 54 Taj employees this week that likens the national UNITE HERE company to a Ponzi scheme that makes use of dues to enrich the lives of its leadership at a cost that is detrimental its members.

‘It is a fact that is undisputable your union leadership declined to negotiate with the Taj as its losses were mounting and it was pushed into bankruptcy. Your union leadership refused to consider any concession that could have helped keep the Taj afloat, and that is because your jobs do not matter to the union leadership,’ Icahn had written.

Icahnoclast

The once bustling gambling mecca regarding the east coast is now home to just eight total gambling enterprises, and Icahn now has control of two, or 25 % of the town’s gaming venues. That means along with Caesars Entertainment, owners of Bally’s, Caesars Atlantic City, and Harrah’s, Icahn features a little monopoly on the town where the game of Monopoly relies.

Thought it’s understandable union workers want and need their own health insurance and pension benefits reinstated, their techniques might be going about this in the way that is wrong. This week, Local 54 delivered a letter to Icahn’s midtown Manhattan office with a summary of its demands, along with an apple pie, a dig in a reaction to Icahn saying ‘apple pie and roses isn’t how a world works’ earlier this year.

Jeb Bush Latest GOP Candidate to Enter Republican Presidential Race

Formally formal: After many months of unofficial fundraising, Jeb Bush confirmed their bid for the 2016 GOP nomination today. The son and brother of two past US presidents is hoping to separate their campaign from his rather famous family name. Sort of. (Image: Erik Schelzig/AP)

Jeb Bush joined the ever-expanding crowd of Republican candidates within the 2016 election that is presidential Monday, by having an announcement at Miami-Dade College within the afternoon. But unlike many of the greater than the usual dozen candidates into the GOP field, Bush will be hoping to run from the position of strength, as he will be one of the favorites for the party’s nomination in the early going of the campaign.

‘In any language my message will be an optimistic one, that we can make the decades just ahead in America the greatest time ever to be alive in this world,’ the latest Bush political dynasty candidate opined, using both English and Spanish to address the live and undoubtedly massive TV audience because I am certain.

Columba Bush, a first-generation immigrant that is mexican married Jeb 41 years back, could prove critical in helping him achieve Hispanic voters. (Image: Bill Ingalls/NASA/Getty)

Columba Bush, who is married to the politician for 41 years and was originally from León, Guanajuato in Mexico, will undoubtedly be an important force in a country grappling with immigration and dual-language issues on an basis that is almost daily.

In reality, the story goes that Mrs. Bush would not even speak English when she married Jeb back in 1974. Her mother was reportedly a migrant worker and food server.

Bush may need the help https://myfreepokies.com. Even though the previous Florida governor is often the frontrunner in national polls of Republican voters, though that advantage is exceedingly narrow. In fact, it may be more accurate to look at Bush, Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, and Florida Senator Marco Rubio as co-leaders at this stage that is early.

Strong Establishment Candidate

That said, Bush has a lot of advantages that may make his campaign a strong one. For one, he will have no trouble money that is raising.

One super PAC that is backing him had hoped to increase $100 million by the end of June, and while they’ll nearly definitely come up in short supply of that goal, it’s clear there will be plenty of capital for the Bush war chest.

He’ll also have endorsements that are numerous Republican establishment figures, as well as being a title that voters are familiar with, although their Jeb! 2016 slogan seems to indicate he’s attempting not to ever ride on at least the most apparent of coattails. After all, that famous last name is a double-edged sword, based on which voters you’re talking to.

While both his brother and father have previously served as president, Jeb Bush is attempting in order to avoid being seen simply because the next in type of succession, by having a ‘royal’ aspect that lots of voters may not be comfortable with.

Campaign Was Unofficial for Months

Of course, by any standard that is reasonable Bush’s campaign has been underway for months, but he has carefully skirted the line to avoid officially launching a campaign organization until now. Over the week-end, Bush told CNN that becoming a formal candidate will allow him to better articulate his message towards the US people.

‘I think this transition to a candidacy will allow me to become more direct about my advocacy of the leadership skills essential for the next president to fix a few things,’ Bush stated while in, of all of the places, Estonia on the weekend. ‘ And as a candidate, contrary to someone who has been listening and learning along the real means, I’ll offer up alternatives to the path we are on also, so we’ll become more specific on policy.’

Historically Opposed to Gambling

It’s uncertain whether we are going to get any details on Bush’s video gaming policies, but his past stances on gambling issues while governor of Florida make it pretty clear that he isn’t any fan of gambling enterprises, as he strongly opposed gambling expansion in the state. His stances on Internet gambling are less clear, though it is hard to assume he would be any friendlier to online poker and casino games than he was to their land-based counterparts.

Maybe more importantly to their campaign, Bush may have to conquer conservative voters who are not necessarily on board together with stances on immigration and education, both areas where his wife could become a campaign that is important. He additionally recently struggled with questions over how he’d have handled the war in Iraq, and fired his campaign supervisor simply last week due to squabbles inside their camp.