
Danielle ‘dmoongirl’ Andersen ended up being mostly of the remaining Ultimate Poker pros still extant before the site announced it shut down in Nevada.
Ultimate Poker has shut straight down its Nevada online poker site, ending a run that is 19-month becoming the very first regulated Internet poker web site in america. The company has now become the first also to end operations in Nevada, leaving simply two other poker providers active in the state.
The Ultimate Poker closure will, at least for now, leave Ultimate Gaming with no active Internet video gaming operations in the United States. 8 weeks ago, the company also pulled out from the New Jersey market, citing the contractual dilemmas it ended up being having utilizing the Trump Taj Mahal.
Revenues Didn’t Live Up to Expectations
‘on the web poker revenues in Nevada have fallen far short of original projections,’ said Ultimate Gaming Chairman Tom Breitling. ‘Moreover, the state-by-state approach to online video gaming has developed an incredibly cost-prohibitive and operating environment that is challenging. These factors have combined to make the course to profitability extremely uncertain and difficult. Consequently, we have decided to cease operations.’
Ultimate Poker suffered from just what many saw as inferior pc software and deficiencies in brand recognition. But the site had hoped to make up for this in Nevada by beating your competitors to the market, something it attained by launching months that are several anyone else could allow it to be through the state’s regulatory needs.
Early Advantage Evaporates with Competition
That advantage place the company in a position that is excellent the start of the state’s regulated Internet poker market. However it was just a matter of time before larger names came to the state to compete, and the second room to enter the marketplace was a bit of a juggernaut: the Caesars-backed WSOP.com, which featured the well-known (and well-respected) World group of Poker brand.
Before very long, WSOP.com had surpassed Ultimate Poker because the biggest site in the state. While Ultimate held on to a little player base, WSOP.com now controls about two-thirds of the market, a share that will become nearly 100 % once the Ultimate Poker shutdown is complete.
Since Ultimate Gaming left New Jersey, there had been some signs that the company was trying to manage costs. That included cutting a lot of the site’s stable of professional poker players, including Jason Somerville. One of the few remaining Ultimate pros, Danielle ‘dmoongirl’ Andersen, stated she discovered concerning the end of Ultimate Poker in Nevada on Twitter.
‘Obviously saddened by the @UltimatePoker news,’ Andersen tweeted on afternoon friday. ‘Appreciative of most the opportunities they provided for myself & the poker community. All I can do is hope like hell the future is brighter because of this game I love so much.’
Smooth Shutdown Expected for Players
Ultimate Gaming says they will work with state regulators to make sure a shutdown that is smooth and there generally seems to be no basis for players to be concerned in regards to the safety of their account balances at this time.
‘We are grateful to your Nevada Gaming Commission and Gaming Control Board for allowing us to be the very first company to operate on-line poker in Nevada and significantly appreciate their leadership and support as the first state to license and control internet poker,’ Breitling said. ‘we have been working closely with the Gaming Control Board to ensure a smooth change for our customers as we cease Nevada operations.’
The exit of Ultimate makes just two poker spaces staying in the Nevada market. Along with WSOP.com, addititionally there is the Real Gaming site operated by South Point Casino, though that site has traffic that is negligible.
Mohegan Sun Looks to Expansion as Connecticut Takes on Massachusetts
The Mohegan Sun Casino in Uncasville, Connecticut will fight customers that are losing neighboring Massachusetts. (Image: kickingdesigns.com)
Mohegan Sun has become steeling itself to take on Massachusetts, instead of beating a retreat that is humiliating losing the bid for an eastern Massachusetts casino permit this season.
Sunlight wants to construct a new casino in north Connecticut to compete with the $800 million MGM Resorts casino scheduled to open across the border in Springfield in 2017.
The Springfield casino is expected to derive a 3rd of its visitors from Connecticut, putting Mohegan Sun in an offensive place to keep its land gambling population from bleeding over the state border to Massachusetts.
Sixty % of Massachusetts residents voted in favor of keeping casino video gaming adhering to a public referendum in this year’s midterm elections, and thus MGM and Wynn Resorts, the latter of which was issued the east Massachusetts license at the expense of Mohegan Sun, are actually free to push ahead with their projects.
And while Connecticut may have been praying that voters would elect to ‘repeal the deal,’ the state must now act to safeguard its casino industry from potentially competition that is devastating.
‘The competition is on. The competition has begun,’ president of the Mohegan tribe Kevin Brown declared in an interview with the Connecticut Mirror this week.
‘This is not a conversation that is new however, its certainly a revived conversation,’ he added. ‘we need to do something in the real face regarding the development of Massachusetts gaming. To do otherwise would be short-sighted on our component.
‘[The Massachusetts casino developers] undoubtedly haven’t been shy about saying they’re not ones to lose more revenue from Massachusetts gamers gonna Connecticut,’ he included.
Game on, apparently.
Financial Peril
Moody’s Investment Analysts warned last month that Mohegan Sun could face ‘financial peril’ after losing the East Massachusetts casino permit. Had it won, said gaming analyst Keith Foley, its monetary situation ‘would have enhanced materially.’ The Mohegan Sun Casino in Uncasville is very leveraged, he added, and could face debt that is significant just as the two proposed Massachusetts casinos open their doors for business in 2017.
Both Connecticut casino resorts, Mohegan Sun and Foxwoods, were hit hard by the worldwide economic depression of 2008 and tend to be over $1 billion with debt.
Difficult Process
While expansion may be within the cards, it’s going to be a lengthy and difficult process that is legislative. Connecticut has sanctioned casinos in its southeast since the very early nineties in return for the part of the profits. Only the Mohegans as well as the Mashantucket Pequots, who run Foxwoods, are permitted to use casino gambling into the continuing state, slotsforfun-ca.com because of the provision that no other entity may do so.
This means that expansion will be a complex procedure that is legal needing the approval of the legislature, the governor and both tribes.
Nevertheless, Brown told the Connecticut Mirror that he had had some ‘point-to-point conversations’ with Mashantucket Pequots’ tribal chairman Rodney Butler on the issue and that ‘both agree that these (discussions) are an essential move.’
Meanwhile, Representative Peggy Sayers, whom recently oversaw a task that is legislative studying regional gaming competition, concluded that Connecticut ‘must just take bold and instant action to protect and expand our state’s gaming industry.’
And Representative Stephen Dargan, leader for the panel that oversees gaming legislation problems in Connecticut, said this week which he desires to hold a hearing later in the thirty days on how best to protect the industry.
Revel to Reopen Under New Owners, While Nj-new Jersey Showboat Goes Collegiate
Atlantic City’s Revel will reopen as being a new casino, but exactly when is still unclear. (Image: Ben Fogletto/pressofatlanticcity.com)
The new owners of Atlantic City’s Revel Casino, Toronto-based asset management firm Brookfield Asset Management Inc., have announced they will invest $200 million to redevelop the formerly swank property, aided by the aim of reopening it yet again next year. Brookfield bid $110 million for the property at auction month that is last a fraction of its original $2.4 billion building cost.
James Kehoe, chairman of brand New Jersey’s Casino Reinvestment Redevelopment Authority, said that the investment team expects to perform the purchase next month. Apart from that, he added, the group has not set a detailed timetable for Revel’s next phase.
Revel had been a grand plan designed to regenerate Atlantic City, but was conceived unfortunately hitting the market just as the global economic downturn from which Atlantic City has failed to recover went into full swing.
Year along with the Showboat, it was one of four of Atlantic City’s 12 casinos to close in 2014, with another, the Trump Taj Mahal, unlikely to see in the New. Revel launched amid much fanfare in 2012, but with its huge operating costs, it failed to ever make money, and also by the time it closed early in the day this year, was leaking over $1 million a week.
From Showboat to Satellite Campus
Meanwhile, Richard Stockton College has snapped up the Showboat Casino from Caesars Entertainment for the undisclosed amount. The house, on the Atlantic City Boardwalk, will end up a satellite campus for the undergraduate university, which is situated in Ponoma in Atlantic County.
The Showboat shut its doors in August, having failed to locate a buyer, and despite being a profitable operation for owners Caesars Entertainment. The Mardi Gras-themed casino opened in 1987 and was bought by Caesars in 1998.
It also had relatively low operating costs, which enabled it to turn a profit of almost $2 million last year while it was the smallest of Caesars’ Atlantic City properties, in terms of net revenue. But, by the beginning of 2014, it absolutely was clear that the casino market in Atlantic City had become saturated and the company’s other properties, Harrahs Atlantic City and Caesars Atlantic City, needed some elbow room. The main purchase contract is that the home would not reopen as a casino.
‘There is too much capacity in Atlantic City currently, such that the comes back to existing ability are under great pressure,’ Caesars CEO Gary Loveman said recently. ‘So we’re looking at our choices to decrease the cost of doing business here, options to reduce capability.’
Diversifying the City
Stockton President Herman Saatkamp had been unable to discuss the details of the purchase, which includes 28 acres, as well as the 1,425,000 square-foot building, until it is finalized.
‘Our intent would be to engage in a task that improves Stockton’s educational growth, offerings and cost-containment while at the exact same time brings new educational opportunities to Atlantic City,’ Saatkamp stated. ‘Because we are just at the letter-of-intent stage and limited by a confidentiality contract, it is premature for me to give fully out any additional information.’
‘The transformation and revitalization of Atlantic City requires the addition of a set that is diverse of for individuals to come see,’ said Loveman, commenting regarding the deal. ‘I believe the construction of a Stockton campus there will help diversify the economy of the city, that is critical to its future wellbeing.’