The US casino industry reported its fifth straight year of annual revenue growth in 2019, a streak that is all but certain to end when the pandemic-plagued 2020 figures are released this time next year.

On Thursday, the American Gaming Association released its annual State of the States report, detailing the US commercial casino sector’s performance in 2019. Last year saw gaming revenue top $43.6b, a 3.7% rise over 2018’s figure, the fifth consecutive year of annual growth and a new record high.

AGA CEO Bill Miller noted that the COVID-19 coronavirus had derailed the casino sector’s momentum, going from “continued record-breaking growth to complete shutdown” in just 11 days this March.

The US gaming industry “has never faced a bigger challenge” but Miller maintains that the sector has bounced back before, as it did after the 2008 global economic meltdown, and expressed confidence that its resilience will see it through this current crisis.

Nevada’s casinos are just hours away from reopening their doors, and even civil unrest in the streets can’t dampen their enthusiasm.

Having been cleared by the governor to reopen to the public as of June 4, some Nevada casinos plan to take that timeline literally, throwing open their doors as of 12:01am Thursday to end their 78-day COVID-19 shutdown as soon as possible.

If other states are any judge, gamblers who dare cross a casino threshold will find that the new health and safety precautions take a bit of getting used to, but they’ll adjust. All Nevada venues are limited to operating at 50% capacity, meaning those casinos that have been lucky enough to book a high volume of room reservations may be forced to limit walk-in guests.

The civil unrest that has gripped the nation following George Floyd’s death at the hands of Minneapolis police won’t derail the casino relaunch timeline, but the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority decided to pull a planned 30-second television commercial promoting the relaunch, citing “current events.”

Online sports bettors not only spent less money wagering during the COVID-19 pandemic, they also decreased their online casino spending, upending a prevailing narrative of this period.

A new study of an unspecified “large European online gambling operator” with customers in Finland, Germany, Norway and Sweden concluded that “the frequency of wagering upon online casino games by online sports bettors before COVID-19-related lockdown significantly decreased during the COVID-19 pandemic period.”

The unnamed operator’s customer data, which covered online sports betting and casino activity between January 1 to April 30, was analyzed by Michael Auer of German data science firm Neccton, Doris Malischnig of the Office of Addiction and Drug Policy of Vienna, and Mark D. Griffiths of University of Nottingham’s International Gaming Research Unit.  

The data involved 5,396 bettors, around 70% of whom also played online casino games, then the data on these hybrid gamblers was split into two sets: the year through March 7 – roughly corresponding to the start of social isolation measures – and the subsequent period through April 20.

Social gaming giants PlayTika and DoubleDown Interactive are preparing initial public offerings, apparently taking advantage of the prevailing view that pathogen-related lockdowns are only ever just around the corner.

On Tuesday, word broke that South Korea’s DoubleDown Interactive had filed papers with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to take itself public. The Seoul-based company reportedly hopes to raise up to $100m from this initial public offering and begin a new life on the Nasdaq exchange under the symbol DDI.

DoubleDown Interactive, formerly known as DoubleU Games, purchased DoubleDown from International Game Technology (IGT) three years ago for $825m. IGT turned heads in 2012 when it paid $500m for the Seattle-based business, although those frowns turned upside down when DoubleDown became a key contributor to IGT’s earnings reports. DoubleDown Interactive reported revenue of $281m in the 12 months ending March 31.

Must be something in the air besides COVID-19, as Tuesday also brought word that Playtika Ltd, the company behind the blockbuster social casino title Slotomania, was also prepping a US IPO. Reuters reported that Playtika’s owners hope to raise up to $1b via the listing.

New Zealand casino operator SkyCity Entertainment Group said business has been “encouraging” since the company reopened its three local casinos following their lengthy COVID-19 shutdown.

In a trading update released Wednesday, SkyCity said it was encouraged that local gamblers were returning to its Auckland, Hamilton and Queenstown properties since their May 14 reopening. The casinos are operating with new health and safety precautions that dramatically limit attendance and the number of gaming positions.

The Queenstown property’s Wharf Casino remains closed but domestic gaming activity at Hamilton and the company’s flagship Auckland property has been “very pleasing, particularly in electronic gaming machines” (EGM). Table game activity was said to be “steadily improving from a slow start,” likely due to New Zealand’s borders remaining closed to international high-rollers.

SkyCity’s hotel occupancy is averaging only around 32%, although this ramps up to 90% on weekends. Food & beverage sales are “growing steadily,” but the company expects its non-gaming amenities won’t truly recover until those international borders reopen.

Back in 2013, the World Poker Tour decided that it was long overdue in joining the High Roller set. In fact, to be specific, the Super High Roller set.

The WPT Alpha8 tournament series was born. Nine events and two years later, the series ground to a halt, going out with a whimper, barely announced, yet high roller events seem to be more popular than ever before. So why didn’t Alpha8 work?

The buy-in was a whopping $100,000 (or in other countries’ currencies, £100,000 or €100,000, for example). That shouldn’t have put players off, however, and Season 1 visited Hollywood, London’s Park Lane, St. Kitts and Johannesburg in its quest to provide high rolling thrills to its players across four tournament stops.

Unfortunately, across those four events, they averaged less than 20 players per event, and Philipp Gruissem won back-to-back events in London and St. Kitts. It was great for the German poker legend, but in terms of advertising the opening season, the WPT would have loved four different faces to share. The 10-player Johannesburg event saw Dan ‘Jungleman’ Cates win just $500,000.

UK gambling operator GVC Holdings has won one fight and lost another with the country’s advertising watchdog.

On Wednesday, the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) dismissed a complaint filed against GVC’s Ladbrokes betting brand for a television commercial that some viewers felt depicted gambling addicts engaging in daily activities that prioritized gambling in their lives.

The ad showed a man celebrating after filling his car’s gas tank and getting the spinning numbers to stop at £77.77. A second man then repeats the phrase ‘hit me’ as fillings are added to the sandwich he’s ordering, claiming that he likes to “double down” when the time is right. Finally, a women spins a circular clothing rail featuring only red and black garments while saying there are “few things more exciting than a spinning wheel.”

Ladbrokes’ response to the complaint was that the ad was a “fun parody of everyday life” while rejecting the assertion that gambling “took precedence over the characters’ work or other daily activities.” Lads said none of the scenes “showed gambling, real or imagined, taking priority over actions.”

The Drew, the Las Vegas Strip casino that was previously going to be known as the Fontainebleau, was shunned for years after it shut down in 2009. That unexpected demise was brought about by a lack of money, which forced the property into bankruptcy. It would be another eight years before someone had the courage to reignite the construction fuse and try to complete the project, but it now appears that the casino is about to meet the same fate it did before. The Witkoff Group, which purchased the property from Carl Icahn in 2017, has defaulted on a loan worth $2 billion. 

The Drew, so named to honor the son of The Witkoff Group founder Steve Witkoff, had initially been expected to be up and running sometime this year. However, those plans were already pushed back when Witkoff announced a year ago that at least two more years were needed to complete what would become the tallest structure on the Strip. That may have been an indication of things to come, as media outlets are reporting that the resort has “suspended principal and interest payments” for a loan to complete the property’s construction as of May 8. 

That loan is reportedly worth $2 billion and was secured at the beginning of this year. The money was provided from a variety of sources that included U.S. investment banks and two investment firms out of South Korea, Mirae and NH Investments & Securities. Apparently, Witkoff has defaulted on the portion that was provided by the U.S.-based firms and, should they decide to seize the assets to cover their losses, all players involved could see massive losses. 

In business, timing has a lot to do with how successful an endeavor is. The original Fontainebleau suffered due to the 2008 economic crash and couldn’t be completed. Icahn then purchased it at a steal for $150 million two years later, continuing to pay $10 million each year to cover the expenses on an empty building until he could find a buyer. Witkoff finally bought it in 2017 for $600 million, which turned out to be a good deal for Icahn – about $220 million spent and $600 million earned. Icahn’s timing was much better than that of the former developers, Fontainebleau Resorts.