Word: casino
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...mile or two down the Strip, MGM Mirage just sold off Treasure Island for $775 million to billionaire casino operator Phil Ruffin. The cash infusion should help the corporation finish construction on its $9.1 billion CityCenter, the largest private construction job in the U.S. Yet even in the best-case scenario, Vegas - and the rest of the country - won't begin to drive out of the ditch until the end of next year, as consumer spending improves, new hiring resumes and the city's battered construction industry gets back on its feet. The worst case? The recession deepens...
...though, there are few better displays of Dubai's open embrace of globalization than the partnership that Dubai ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum (a pioneering figure in the conservative, Muslim Arabian Peninsula) has established with Kerzner - a famously hard-working, hard-partying casino mogul who is Jewish. Starting more than a decade ago, their affiliation has matured into a full-fledged business relationship that seeks opportunities far beyond Dubai. In 2006, Istithmar, another of the "Dubai Inc." companies owned by Sheikh Mohammed's government, took a major stake in Kerzner International, which owns and operates luxury hotels from...
...Some might see a Jewish businessman investing hundreds of millions of dollars with Arab partners in the heart of the conflict-prone Middle East as a man taking the gamble of a lifetime. Not Kerzner. He came here soon after his plan to build a casino complex in the Israeli resort of Eilat fell through, and has felt at home ever since. "We are businessmen from Dubai and we look at it as business," explains bin Sulayem. "If he is the best Jewish man but has no vision, we wouldn't do business with him. But if he is from...
...Sulayem think, would be to make piles of money together in times that are looking increasingly difficult for tourism. They plan to open other major resorts in Morocco, Zanzibar and South Africa in the coming year or so, although a deal with MGM Mirage to launch a major new casino project on the Las Vegas Strip is being put on hold at least until the credit squeeze eases up. "It's been quite challenging," Kerzner says. "We continue to do reasonable business but there's no question the marketplace has taken...
...long run however, all this may be good news, says Desmond Lam, a senior research fellow at the University of South Australia who specializes in casino marketing and Chinese gaming. He says the current stumbling blocks may force Macau to address some of the economic and social problems that have started to fester beneath those glowing numbers. "On a whole, [the slowdown] is good for Macau," he says. "It was going too fast." Since 2003, gaming revenue has increased by an average of 30% per year, eclipsing that of the Las Vegas Strip by 2006. With...