The public market allowed Golden to broaden. This is why the gaming firm’s going personal.

Is the Strip recovering after an terrible 2025 for visitation and tourism? The query is extra difficult than you would possibly assume. 

I mentioned the subject on Monday with City Cast host Jesse Merrick. You can test it out here or wherever you get your podcasts.

Also, I teased some adjustments in final week’s Indy Gaming. Today’s e-newsletter would be the final one which seems on The Nevada Independent residence web page. You will obtain the e-newsletter each different Wednesday in your e mail, however the lead story shall be changed by a round-up of gaming, tourism and sports activities enterprise gadgets with some commentary from yours really. Thank you on your continued help. 

Please e mail me at [email protected] with any questions.

More than a decade in the past, Las Vegas-based Golden Entertainment went public by a $341 million merger with a Minnesota-based firm that owned one property in northern Maryland. 

Then final month, Golden left the Nasdaq and is once more a privately owned enterprise by a $1.16 billion sale and leaseback with actual property funding belief VICI Properties.

It’s a development.

Last yr, two Nevada-based gaming tools suppliers, IGT and AGS, have been purchased out by giant hedge funds and delisted from the New York Stock Exchange. By going personal, monetary info is hidden and solely accessible to firm insiders and advisers.

Another potential buyout could possibly be looming. Caesars Entertainment is reportedly deep into talks with billionaire investor Tilman Fertitta about acquiring the gaming company in a deal valued between $5 billion and $7 billion, which might take the on line casino operator with greater than a dozen Nevada casinos personal. 

As for Golden, it has purchased or offered greater than $2 billion in belongings since 2015, placing the corporate able engaging to VICI. Going personal means returning to its roots and placing management of the enterprise again within the fingers of the Sartini household. CEO Blake Sartini based the corporate in 2001 with 19 Las Vegas-area taverns.

“Ultimately, we’re a family-owned, family-operated company,” mentioned Golden Senior Vice President and Chief Operating Officer Blake Sartini II, who began his career on the firm’s former Colorado casinos. 

“We now can focus on running our operations without having that three-month report card [quarterly earnings] that comes with being a public company,” he mentioned. “Now we can game-plan with a 12-month strategy.”

The objective is straightforward — bettering and rising the varied companies, which embody 73 statewide taverns and 7 casinos unfold between Las Vegas, Laughlin and Pahrump. 

Sartini mentioned Golden will discover different alternatives in markets the place the corporate would not have casinos, together with Northern Nevada and rural areas. 

“We like the regional Nevada market,” Sartini mentioned. “We would be willing to entertain any regional opportunity that would come our way.”

The actual property related to the corporate’s Nevada casinos was offered to VICI, whereas Golden retained operations masking greater than 5,500 slot machines, 80 desk video games, and 6,000 resort rooms.

VICI, which paid off Golden’s $426 million debt within the deal, will obtain $87 million in annual lease from Golden for the casinos. The determine will increase yearly by 2 % beginning within the third yr of the 30-year contract.

“Having VICI as a partner allows us to go out there and see what we can do with this current platform. We definitely want to see where we can find growth,” Sartini mentioned. “This is their first exposure to certain regional and local markets, which gives them a good balance as the Strip may continue to see some headwinds.”

VICI may present Golden perception to the Strip, given the actual property belief is landlord for practically a dozen Strip resorts together with Caesars Palace, MGM Grand Las Vegas, The Venetian and the under-construction Hard Rock Las Vegas.

The deal added Golden’s STRAT Hotel, Casino & SkyPod onto the VICI roster. While the STRAT is bodily a part of downtown, it’s usually related to the Strip due to its proximity to the northern border at Sahara Avenue. 

Golden purchased the STRAT — which not too long ago celebrated its thirtieth anniversary — in 2017, together with two Arizona Charlie’s properties in Las Vegas and on the Boulder Highway, two Pahrump casinos (a 3rd is shutting down on May 24) and three Laughlin casinos for $850 million. 

At final month’s Nevada Gaming Commission listening to forward of the VICI deal closing, Blake Sartini Sr. advised regulators the corporate has “significant plans” for the Colorado Belle in Laughlin, considered one of its three casinos together with the Aquarius and Edgewater resorts. The riverboat-themed property has been closed since 2020. 

Golden controls 22 acres with 1,000 toes of frontage alongside the Colorado River and the CEO mentioned it “would be logical to assume” that VICI might have a task in financing a undertaking for the placement.

Golden’s tavern enterprise expanded past the well-recognized PT’s mannequin as the corporate acquired two established taverns previously couple of years. In 2024, Golden closed the sale of its market-leading slot route operations in Nevada and Montana to Illinois-based J&J Gaming for $322.5 million. 

J&J helps the gaming operations of the corporate’s taverns beneath the five-year lease settlement, however the companies are nonetheless managed by Golden.

Disclosure: I spent 18 months in company communications with Golden Entertainment from 2016 to 2018.

Side Bets: Items of Interest

✈️ New evaluation exhibits simply how far Vegas worldwide visitation has dropped

Las Vegas noticed worldwide visitation fall virtually 5 % in 2025, with Canada displaying a double-digit lower, the biggest dip of any nation or area. The information is collected by a 3rd social gathering that takes a number of months to compile the outcomes.

• The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority mentioned the full variety of international visitors exceeded 4.7 million. Foreign visitation has slowed because the pandemic; it hit a excessive of slightly below 6 million guests in 2014.
• While visitation from Mexico was up 1 % to beneath 1.2 million, Canada visitation fell 17.4 % to only beneath 1.5 million. 
• The core European markets, together with the United Kingdom, Germany and France, confirmed single-digit drops. Countries within the Asia-Pacific area grew Las Vegas vacationers, with the biggest bounce coming from Japan, the place incoming vacationers have been up 10.5 %.

🍁Meanwhile, downtown Canadian visitation noticed a lift because of Circa

The three downtown properties operated by Circa Resorts have drawn greater than 50,000 Canadian guests over the previous three months by the corporate’s “At Par” program, by which eligible Canadian company obtain $1 U.S. in worth for each 1 Canadian greenback spent, no matter every day trade charges. In an announcement, the corporate mentioned the promotion has generated greater than 5,100 resort room bookings and produced greater than $10 million in slot play. The program will proceed by Aug. 31 and applies to pick out gaming, resort, beverage and leisure choices at Circa Resort & Casino, the D Las Vegas and Golden Gate Hotel and Casino.

🏗️ Conflict might sluggish the $5.1 billion Wynn undertaking within the UAE

Wynn Resorts CEO Craig Billings mentioned the continued Middle East battle would result in a “modest delay” within the deliberate 2027 opening of the $5.1 billion Wynn Al Marjan within the United Arab Emirates (UAE). But he mentioned it would not change the corporate’s outlook available on the market. “The UAE has a world-class tourism infrastructure, unrivaled airport capacity and a strong policy framework. As the region stabilizes, we expect the country will find smart ways to accelerate tourism,” Billings mentioned final week on the corporate’s quarterly earnings convention name. Construction has continued whereas logistical and transport challenges within the area have been manageable, “though we are realistic that the picture could shift as the situation evolves.”

🎸 Sparks Nugget’s monetary efficiency shines because of its occasions heart 

Macquarie Securities gaming analyst Chad Beynon mentioned final week the Sparks Nugget “was the standout” amongst all the casinos operated by Colorado-based Century Casinos. During final week’s quarterly earnings convention name, firm administration credited the resort’s 8,500-seat Nugget Events Center for driving enterprise to the property. Century acquired the resort in 2023 for $195 million. The area supported the Nugget’s 93 % enhance in general money circulate from the resort, eating places and on line casino flooring. The venue hosted a sold-out Brooks & Dunn live performance final month, with headliners Keith Urban, Lady A, Shinedown, Miranda Lambert, Kansas and Deep Purple nonetheless on the calendar this yr. According to the Gaming Control Board, Sparks gaming income within the first three months of 2026 is up greater than 9.1 % to $45.8 million. 

Table Talk: What I’m Reading

🃏 AGA CEO Miller calls federal prediction market regulator ‘a joke’ — Buck Wargo, CDC Gaming Reports

At a Las Vegas occasion, Bill Miller mentioned the top of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission shouldn’t be a regulator however “a cheerleader for the industry.” 

👋 FanDuel CEO Amy Howe is out after five years at the sportsbook — Contessa Brewer, CNBC

FanDuel paid Boyd Gaming $1.76 billion final yr to purchase again a 5 % stake owned by the on line casino operator. The firm deserted its Nevada license to enter prediction markets.

🤠 Adelsons’ Sands hiring ‘casino management’ developers in Dallas amid Texas gambling push — Sasha Richie, Dallas Morning News

The firm says it doesn’t have any initiatives in Dallas and is as a substitute centralizing software program growth in a talent-rich area.