Nevada enjoyed its second straight month of gaming revenue gains thanks to slot spinners and poker players in Las Vegas.
Although the summer is traditionally a busy time for Las Vegas and the surrounding areas, this year’s action was hotter than usual. As per the Nevada’s August 28 press release, “gaming win” for July was up 2.91 percent compared to the same period in 2018.
Adding the most money to the $1,023,950,453 collected was Clark County. The home of Las Vegas, Clark County licensees generated $860,392,390 in revenue compared to $839,034,415 in July 2018.
Las Vegas Strip Revenue Pushes Up Total
As expected, the Las Vegas strip was the most active sector in Clark County with year-on-year revenue improving by 1.63 percent to $541,804,525.
Elsewhere, Downtown Las Vegas was both the county’s and Nevada’s biggest winner in terms of gains with earnings up by 7.56 percent.
Slot revenue has been marked as the biggest reason for the upswing. Commenting on the results, Nevada Gaming Control Board’s Michael Lawton said slot earnings have seen “consistent increases” in recent months.
While slots continue to dominate, poker also created a buzz in Las Vegas this summer. Throughout the World Series of Poker (WSOP), numbers were up across the board.
The $10,000 WSOP Main Event was second largest ever with 8,569 entrants. Beyond that, 12 events attracted north of 5,000 players, while the average number of entries across all events was 2,081.
With the WSOP as a whole attracting 187,298 players (compared to 123,865 in 2018), Las Vegas was a winner, as was poker.
Sin City Upswing Creates Industry Optimism
Looking ahead, the buoyancy of Las Vegas and Nevada as a whole is great for poker.
As well as local poker events enjoying bigger numbers, a general sense of optimize in Sin City is great for poker around the world. Although it may not directly affect the fortunes of regional gaming economies, Las Vegas does have an indirect influence on the industry.
With major gaming brands located there, increased revenue creates a buzz that reverberates globally. In fact, evidence of this can be seen with poker tournaments that followed this year’s WSOP.
Matching the highs seen in Vegas, European events such as EPT in Barcelona have attracted record numbers. In essence, the current financial state of Las Vegas is as much a reflection of a healthy gaming economy as driver of its success.
As other regions see Nevada enjoying its second successive month of revenue gains, they’ll draw confidence from that. This, in turn, could spiral into an ongoing series of positive results across the gaming sector.
