US gambling revenue dropped  15% in May. In Las Vegas, the percentage is 16.4%. As for Atlantic City, the casinos gambling revenue down 11% in June, comparing with the same month of the last year (a single casino shows an increase in revenue, Harrah’s Resort Casino). In Illinois, gambling revenue was down more than 20 percent in June compared to June 2007.

The analyst Robin Farley of UBS wrote in a report that “the decline in Strip revenues is worse than the period immediately following Sept. 11, 2001 and except for January 2002 is the worst monthly performance in more than 10 years…The weakness in gaming revenues was not confined exclusively to the Strip as the Las Vegas locals market declined 19.5% in May, bringing year to date revenues down 8.7%.”

Sands, Wynn, Boyd… everything is sliding.

“The decline appears to be accelerating,” said Nick Danna, an analyst with Stern Agee & Leach.

Jim Murren, president of MGM Mirage, says that this drop is a temporarily situation, an usual cycle.

For Atlantic City, the most important decline is for Trump Marina Casino, 23%.

For the casino games, the reports say that table games and slot machines fell down almost the same in Las Vegas, but slots declined more in Atlantic City.

I am not a specialist, but I think that there are some important factors, external to the gambling industry, that influence it. And one of the most important, if not the most important, is the economic crisis. Including the petrol price, unemployment, the real estate crisis, as well as the reduction in flights as airlines cut back their services.

A second factor is the tourist market, influenced also by the economic crisis but not only. The restrictions implemented last years by US for the external tourists is, maybe, more important for the tourist market than the crisis.

And, to not forget the smoking ban, that will decrease even more the gambling revenue.

The crisis in US gambling industry will be increased by the casino and hotel investments started by the operators, for which it will not be possible to make the payments to the banks (for ex., Tropicana Entertainment defaulting on $2.7bn debts).

In fact, when you start an isolationist policy, including for the online gambling market, you have to take into consideration the secondary effects that can become major effects, in time.

Gambling as a betting action – wagering money or something of material value on an event with an uncertain outcome with the primary intent of winning additional money or material goods.

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Binion’s Gambling Hall & Hotel is a hotel and casino located in downtown Las Vegas, Nevada on the Fremont Street Experience. The casino is named for its founder, Benny Binion and has 366 rooms, two restaurants and a rooftop pool. It is one of the casinos owned by the MTR Gaming Group.

History

After buying Binion’s Horseshoe, Harrah’s Entertainment sold the property on March 11, 2004 to MTR Gaming Group, which operated the hotel. Harrah’s continued to operate the casino under a temporary contract until March of 2005. Harrah’s retained the rights to the Horseshoe name and the World Series of Poker name.

On March 11, 2005, MTR Gaming Group officially took control of the operation of the casino and it was renamed it Binion’s Gambling Hall & Hotel.

In July of 2005 the hotel hosted the World Series of Poker finals. This was the last time the event would be held at Binion’s and hosted in downtown Las Vegas. The casino still retains a large poker area and features displays on the Poker Hall of Fame as well as previous WSOP Champions.

Other locations

Following Jack’s with his sister, he went on to open highly successful riverboat casinos under the Horseshoe name:

• Horseshoe Casino Tunica
• Horseshoe Casino Hammond
• Horseshoe Casino Bossier City

These casinos went to Harrah’s after the 2004 sale, but remained under the Horseshoe brand. Jack Binion continues to promote the casinos for Harrah’s.

Movie history

• Lucky You (2006)

This guide is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

Gambling revenue will grow to $155 billion in 2012 from a 2007 revenue of $114 billion with an annually rate of 6.5 percent per year, says PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP in a report released this week.

Asia, and especially Macau, will be the world’s fastest growing gambling region.

In accordance with this report, the US revenue will decline in 2008, due to the mortgage crisis and high gas and travel price. But, starting with 2010, Las Vegas will expects a new raise.

Online gambling and sports betting is expected to have a 4.9% yearly increase in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, and a 4.5% yearly increase for the US tribal casinos. The most important increase for US is predicted for sports betting, rising 7% to $7.6 billion in 2012.

For immediate release

Johan Kinnander has been appointed board member in the European internet gaming company Betsafe.com

Johan Kinnander, who is CEO at Glife AB, one of Sweden’s leading online social networks, has extensive experience of online marketing, especially from his time as CEO at Google in Scandinavia and AD Pepper Media. He has established and built a number of successful companies in the Nordic market.

- I believe that Betsafe’s business will increase ejoinsxtensively the next coming years and I hope I can contribute with my knowledge and network to help them make this trip as smooth as possible, says Johan Kinnander who has followed the development of internet gaming during his time with different internet companies.

- We are very satisfied with the recruitment of a board member with such a long and thorough experience of internet business, says a happy Henrik Persson Ekdahl, Betsafe’s CEO.

Johan’s background contributes with exactly the right competence that we need to be able to successfully grow on our already strong Nordic market, and on our upcoming endeavors. We intend to strengthen the board with at least 2 more significant members during 2008. Johan will be a board member in the Norwegian company Artic Invest A/S, the investment company that owns www.betsafe.com.

Betsafe.com is an internet gaming company who offer odds, live betting, poker and a casino in English, Norwegian, Swedish, Danish and Finnish at www.betsafe.com. The company  holds its license in Malta, and was recently nominated ”The world’s best bookmaker” by the Norwegian gaming magazine ”TIPS”.

A tour of Las Vegas casinos and hotels
THE adult gambling, adult fun, and entertainment playground of the world

Las Vegas is the most populous city in the state of Nevada, United States. The city is the largest to be founded in the 20th century, and is a major vacation, shopping, and gambling destination. Las Vegas was established in 1905, and officially became a city in 1911. Las Vegas has been the county seat of Clark County since the formation of the county in 1909. The 2000 census reported that the city had a population of 478,434 [1]. The Census Bureau’s official population estimate as of 2004 was 534,847. The city’s Planning and Development Department reported an increase of 41,126 in 2005, for a total population of 575,973. [2]. Recent figures place the population for the Las Vegas metropolitan area, which includes all of Clark County, at over 1.6 Million people (2004 [3]), and the region is the fastest growing in the United States.

The name Las Vegas is often applied to the unincorporated areas of Clark County that surround the city, especially the resort areas on and near the Las Vegas Strip. This 4½ mi (7¼ km) stretch of Las Vegas Boulevard is mostly outside the Las Vegas city limits, in the unincorporated town of Paradise.

The center of gambling in the US, Las Vegas is sometimes called Sin City due to the popularity of legalized gambling, availability of alcoholic beverages any time (like all of Nevada), various forms and degrees of adult entertainment, and legalized prostitution in nearby counties (it is illegal, though, in Las Vegas and Clark County; Nevada law prohibits prostitution in counties which have populations greater than 400,000). The nickname favored by local government and promoters of tourism is The Entertainment Capital of the World. The city’s glamorous image has made it a popular setting for films and television programs.

by MultiMedia and Nicolae Sfetcu

This guide is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

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Queenco Leisure International (QLI) has finalised the terms of an agreement with Constanta Municipality, Romania, granting the QLI concession rights over a historic building in the city, which the company intends to renovate and operate, Casino Constanta.

The agreement is for an initial period of 49 years, but grants QLI the option to extend the terms for a further 24 years, subject to the consent of both the company and Constanta Municipality. Under the terms of the agreement, QLI will invest an approximate total of €10.0 million and pay gross annual royalties of €140,000 to Constanta Municipality.

The building covers an area of 801m² and is located on Constanta’s beachfront. It was built in 1909, and declared a national architectural treasure in 1956. Completed between the two World Wars in art nouveau style according to the plans of the architects, Daniel Renard and Petre Antonescu, the Casino features sumptuous architecture and a wonderful view of the sea. The pedestrian area around the Casino is a sought-after destination for couples and families, especially at sunset.

QLI plans to open Casino Constanta in the second half of 2009, which will operate approximately 24 gaming tables and 250 slot machines. The company also intends to develop the casino as a comprehensive leisure venue with restaurants and other entertainment facilities. In addition to local visitors, QLI believes it will benefit from the high volume of tourists visiting the destination each year, and will also focus on developing a VIP customer base as part of its high roller strategy.

‘I am delighted we have finalised the terms of the Concession Agreement in Constanta, and look forward to working closely with the Municipality over the coming years. We believe that the Constanta concession, upon completion, will generate excellent returns for our shareholders and will be another key step in Queenco’s strategy of expanding our casino portfolio in emerging markets to capitalise on their superior growth.’, said Dror Mizeretz, CEO of QLI.

Queenco Leisure International Ltd. operates and manages two of Greece‘s nine licensed casinos under exclusive gaming licences and the Casino Palace in Romania.

As at 18 June 2007, the Group operated approximately 1,400 slot machines and 130 gaming tables, and employed 2,487 people in 4 countries.

Constanţa (historical names: Tomis, Greek: Κωνστάντια or Constantia, Turkish: Köstence, Bulgarian: Кюстенджа) is the oldest living city in Romania. Constanţa has the biggest harbour on the Black Sea, Port of Constanţa, the fourth largest in Europe, having the potential in the next few years to become the second largest in Europe after Rotterdam. Constanta is also the most popular destination for summer holidays in Romania for both the national and the international market because of its beachfront and cultural attractions.

(Source)

Poker Stars started a new experience, beginning to operate a poker room in Cotai Strip (Dubbed PokerStars Macau), at Grand Waldo Hotel and Casino (25 tables, 250 players, cash games and tournaments).

The poker room was launched this week with a No-Limit Texas Hold’em Charity Poker tournament, for the victims of the recent earthquake in China. Participants competed for HKD $150,000 in prizes, including entries to the $25 000 HKD buy-in September’s APPT Macau event, which features an HKD $25,000 buy-in. That event runs September 1-6, 2008 and has a guarantee of HKD $10,000,000.

“PokerStars is committed to the development of poker in Asia” said Joe Hachem, Poker World Champion and member of Team PokerStars Pro.

$4.5 billion Canadian investment in casino-resort project (“Ho Tram“) in the South of the Vietnam, the theme highlighting the lush natural beauty of the area while showcasing Vietnamese and Asian culture.

The most important investors in this project are Asian Coast Development Ltd. from Toronto and Harbinger Capital LLC from New York

The Ho Tram Strip is being designed by Steelman Partners and spread across 19 hectares of prime real estate on a beach in Xuyen Moc Commune, in Bà Rịa–Vũng Tàu Province, near Ho Chi Minh City.

The first stage of the project (2008-2011) will include two luxurious five star hotels with 2300 rooms and a Las Vegas-style casinos – featuring live entertainment stages and an exclusive VIP area to compliment gaming floors with more than 180 live table games and 2000 electronic games. As recreational facilities, an expansive and luxurious spa, state-of-the-art performance facilities, an engaging upscale retail experience and a wide selection of elegant dining facilities offering local and international cuisine.

It is the most important investment in Vietnam, including, in the first stage, a 2,300 rooms hotel and a casino with 900 gambling tables, 500 slot machines, and a VIP area.

Finally, in 2015, the resort will comprise five hotels with 9,000 rooms and a second casino.

The site plan includes several theatres and museums, a cultural center, and an ongoing parade of events, a championship 200-acre golf course designed by Greg Norman, a country club, and and a site for guests to swim with dolphins.

Vietnam (Vietnamese: Việt Nam), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (Vietnamese: Cộng hòa Xã hội Chủ nghĩa Việt Nam), is the easternmost country on the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is bordered by China to the north, Laos to the northwest, Cambodia to the southwest, and the South China Sea to the east. With a population of over 85 million, Vietnam is the 13th most populous country in the world.

Bà Rịa–Vũng Tàu is a province of Vietnam. It is located on the coast of the country’s southeastern region. It also includes the Côn Đảo islands, located some distance off Vietnam’s southeastern coast. From 1954 to 1975, this province belonged to the Republic of Vietnam.

A gambling affiliate is a commercial entity with a relationship with a peer or a larger entity.

We well define the gambling corporative, a facility that houses and accommodates certain types of gambling activities. It can be a casino, poker room, bingo halls, lotteries, sports betting agency, as well as hotels, restaurants, retail shopping, cruise ships and other tourist attractions. It includes also the entities licensed to provide online gambling services.

A gambling corporative may be referred to as an gambling affiliate of another when it is related to it but not strictly controlled by it, as with a subsidiary relationship, or when it is desired to avoid the appearance of control.

Gambling affiliate marketing typically refers to an electronic version of the traditional gambling advertising channel concept. A gambling affiliate is a website which links back to a corporative gambling site like CasinoTropez.com.

However, as the Internet marketring continues to evolve, gambling affiliates are no longer restricted to website owners. Bloggers and members of different online community forums can be affiliates as well. Many emerging affiliate programs are now accepting bloggers and individuals, not necessarily webmasters, to be affiliates.

A good source for a gambling affiliate to buy an already promoted specific or generic domain name, web site or blog, is Gambling Sites For Sale.

Gambling affiliates can also be referred as publishers. Many publishers are very well known gamblers ( Tony G, Daniel Negreanu, etc.).

Illustration of the concept of gambling affiliate marketing

Gambling affiliate marketing is a web-based marketing practice in which a business rewards one or more gambling affiliates for each visitor or customer brought about by the affiliate’s marketing efforts.

Affiliate marketing is also the name of the industry where a number of different types of companies and individuals are performing this form of internet marketing, including affiliate networks, affiliate management companies and in-house affiliate managers, specialized 3rd party vendors, and various types of affiliates/publishers who promote the products and services of their partners.

Gambling affiliate marketing overlaps with other internet marketing methods to some degree, because affiliates often use regular advertising methods. Those methods include organic search engine optimization, paid search engine marketing, email marketing and in some sense display advertising (in their own web sites, or on specialized web, sites such as Casino Online Advertising). On the other hand, affiliates sometimes use less orthodox techniques like publishing reviews of products or services offered by a partner.

A specific form of email advertising is to publish article, discuss or advertise on specific mailing lists and egroups, such as http://groups.google.com/group/casinoonline, http://groups.google.com/group/onlinegambling, http://groups.google.com/group/pokergame (hosted by Google), or http://groups.yahoo.com/group/bet-gambling, http://groups.yahoo.com/group/casino-gambling, http://groups.yahoo.com/group/casino-players, http://groups.yahoo.com/group/online-poker (hosted by Yahoo!).

One of the most important action in search engine optimization, is to get links back to your site from other similar web sites. Because Google and the other search engines penalize the reciprocal links, it is widely used the cross-linking methods. The best and most efficient ways to do this and this way to promote your web site and get more traffic, are the banner exchange (See MultiMedia BX) and webring methods. A webring in general is a collection of websites from around the Internet joined together in a circular structure. The best gambling webrings you can find at webring.com (http://u.webring.com/hub?ring=bestonlinecasin3, http://u.webring.com/hub?ring=betgambling, http://r.webring.com/hub?ring=poker).

The rise of blogging, interactive online communities and other new technologies, web sites and services based on the concepts that are now called Web 2.0 have impacted the affiliate marketing world as well. Most of the turnkey web sites from Gambling Sites For Sale include these characteristics.

90% of gambling affiliate programs today use revenue sharing or cost per action (CPA) and the remaining 10% are other methods, such as cost per click (CPC) or cost per mille (CPM). CPM and CPC are today still heavily used in display advertising and paid search.

Cost per mille (thousand) (CPM/CPT) requires the publisher only to load the advertising on his website and show it to his visitors in order to get paid a commission, while PPC requires one additional step in the conversion process to generate revenue for the publisher. Visitors must not only be made aware of the ad, but also pursue them to click on it and visit the advertiser’s website.

Cost per click (CPC/PPC) used to be more common in the early days of affiliate marketing, but diminished over time due to click fraud issues that are very similar to the click fraud issues modern search engines are facing today.

In the case of CPM or CPC, the publisher does not care if the visitor is the type of audience that the advertiser tries to attract and is able to convert, because the publisher already earned his commission at this point. This leaves the greater, and, in case of CPM, the full risk and loss (if the visitor can not be converted) to the advertiser.

CPA require that referred visitors do more than visiting the advertiser’s website in order for the affiliate to get paid commission. The advertiser must convert that visitor first. It is in the best interest for the affiliate to send the best targeted traffic to the advertiser as possible to increase the chance of a conversion. The risk and loss is shared between the affiliate and the advertiser.

For this reason affiliate marketing is also called “performance marketing”. Gambling affiliates are not employed by the advertiser whose gambling entity they promote, but the compensation models applied to affiliate marketing are very similar to the ones used for people in the advertisers’ internal sales department.

Some advertisers offer multi-tier programs that distribute commission into a hierarchical referral network of sign-ups and sub-partners. In practical terms: publisher “A” signs up to the program with an advertiser and gets rewarded for the agreed activity conducted by a referred visitor. If publisher “A” attracts other publishers (“B”, “C”, etc.) to sign up for the same program using her sign-up code all future activities by the joining publishers “B” and “C” will result in additional commission (at a lower rate) for publisher “A”.

This system rewards a chain of hierarchical publishers who may or may not know of each others’ existence, yet generate income for the higher level signup.

Two-tier programs exist in the minority of affiliate programs; most are simply one-tier. Referral programs beyond 2-tier are multi-level marketing (MLM) or network marketing.

Gambling affiliate sites are often categorized by advertisers and affiliate networks. There are no industry-wide accepted standards for the categorization. The following list is very generic but commonly understood and used by gambling affiliate marketers:

• Search affiliates that utilize pay per click search engines to promote the advertisers offers
• Comparison gambling sites and directories
• Loyalty sites, typically characterized by providing a reward system for gambling via points back, cash back or charitable donations
• Bonus sites that focus on gambling promotions
• Content and niche sites, including gambling review sites
• Personal websites (these type of sites were the reason for the birth of affiliate marketing, but are today almost reduced to complete irrelevance compared to the other types of affiliate sites)
• Blogs and RSS feeds (See for ex. http://betbloggers.com, where anyone can have a free gambling blog)
• Email list affiliates (owners of large opt-in email list(s))
• Registration path or Co-Registration affiliates who include offers from other companies during a registration process on their own website.
• Gambling directories that list gambling sites by categories without providing bonus, gambling comparison and other features based on information that frequently change and require ongoing updates.
• CPA networks are top tier affiliates that expose offers from gambling advertiser they are affiliated with to their own network of affiliates (not to confuse with 2nd tier)

Gambling affiliate networks that already have a number of advertisers usually also have a large number of publishers. This large pool of publishers could be potentially recruited. There is also an increased chance that publishers in the network apply to the program by themselves, without the need for any recruitment efforts by the advertiser.

Relevant sites that attract the same audiences as the advertiser is trying to attract, but are not competing with the advertiser, are potential affiliate partners as well. Even vendors or existing customers could be recruited as affiliates, if it makes sense and does not violate any laws or regulations.

Almost any website could be recruited as an affiliate publisher, although high traffic websites are more likely interested in (for them) low risk CPM or medium risk CPC deals rather than higher risk CPA or revenue share deals.

Affiliate programs directories are one way to find affiliate programs, another method is large affiliate networks that provide the platform for dozens or even hundreds of advertisers. The third option is to check the target website itself for a reference to their affiliate program. Websites, which offer an affiliate program often, have a link titled “affiliate program”, “affiliates”, “referral program” or “webmasters” somewhere on their website, usually in the footer or “About” section of the site.

Even if all those methods seem to indicate that a site does not have an affiliate program, it could still be the case that there exists a non-public affiliate program. The only way to find out for sure, is to contact the site owner directly and ask.

(Article derived from Wikipedia)

A new MGM Grand casino will open at Foxwoods this weekend. The festivities will be overshadowed by the United Auto Workers that will protest against unfair tipping policy and the Mashantucket Pequot Tribe’s refusal to bargain, trying to negotiate a union contract.

A new way the tips are distributed among dealers is going to decrease their earnings.

“We’re glad we could reach an agreement on this event that works for everyone. We’re glad to be there, we protected our first amendment rights, and we are confident we will get our message out,” said Director of UAW Region 9a, Bob Madore.

The Union will try to make aware the casino customers of the unfair labor practices, many dealers joining the protest.

The opening will have as guests many celebrities, such as Michael Douglas and his wife, Catherine Zeta Jones, and Jamie Lynn Sigler.

Yahoo! changes his terms of service regarding the gambling  ads, for the UK advertisers. This is due to the change in UK legislation for gambling advertising, that is now less restrictive.

AccuraCast says that Yahoo! sent an email to its UK clients telling them that under recent UK legislation on gambling advertising, UK gambling ads may now include invitations to play or any mention of money, bonuses and prizes.

Yahoo Search Marketing have partnered recently with Media Corporation, an Internet media firm which owns onthebox.com, gambling.com and sport.co.uk, to provide search results and advertising across Media Corp’s extensive publishing network.

During July 29-30, 2008, will take place the conference Next Generation in Gambling (NGG) (Exploring multi-channel delivery of games to customers while complying with federal and state laws in Canada, United States and Latin America).

The event will target the casino, racing, and lottery companies working in North American jurisdictions, focusing to expand delivery channels while staying in compliance with the law, developing multi-channel strategies to bring gaming products directly to consumers is a logical next step.

The topics will cover technological information via the dedicated technology track, marketing tips, thought-provoking keynotes, and panel discussions from professional speakers like Hon. Alfonse D’Amato (Chairman and Chief Executive, Poker Players Alliance), Chris Collins (Linden Lab), Shawn Kreloff (CEO, Sona Mobile).

Source: Clarion Gaming – The Next Generation in Gambling