Contrary to earlier dire predictions, it seems Las Vegas sports books actually turned a profit off Super Bowl Sunday, albeit a teenie one. While the overall handle was $87.5m – the best it’s been in three years, but still down from the +$90m run of 2005-08 – the popularity of parlay bets on the Packers covering the spread and the point total going over cut deep into the books’ margins. According to the Nevada Gaming Control Board, the net win for the state’s 183 books was a mere $742k — less than 1%. Compare that to 2010’s 8.3% hold based on a handle of $82.7m and things look pretty bad. Compare it to 2008’s $2.5m loss on a handle of $92m and things look a whole lot better. Check out Vegas’ performance over the past decade below right:
While Vegas sports books represent a pitifully small total of casinos’ overall win (1-3%), every little bit helps when business is in the dumpster. In other ‘good news’ news, the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority announced that 37m tourists graced the town with their presence in 2010; 2.7% more than in 2009. However, hotel occupancy was just above 80% — down 1.1% on the year — so most of these extra tourists apparently chose to sleep in the streets. Perhaps it was the 2% rise in room rate that made the curb look like a pillow, we don’t know.
While more people may be coming to Vegas, a certain high roller may not be back for a while. Charlie Sheen blows a lot of dough (and does a lot of blow) when he rolls into Vegas (or any other town), but not even the Super Bowl could convince the troubled Two And A Half Men thespian to get off his couch on Sunday. According to the ever reliable TMZ, Charlie watched the game from the comfort of his own home theater, with a bottle of Gatorade(!) in his hand and nary a porn star in sight. We’re glad to hear that Charlie’s taking his stint in self-rehab seriously, but the photo of the red-velvet chairs in the theater where porn is purported to be on a permanent loop has us wondering: when was the last time those chairs were steam-cleaned? Ewwww…
