Nevada casinos win tops $1B for the 8th time in the past year

Nevada casinos topped $1 billion in house winnings in January for the second consecutive month and eighth time in the past 12 months.

The state Gaming Control Board on Friday reported the statewide casino win figure was slightly lower than in December, but was up almost 5.5% compared with the same month in 2019.

However, Gaming Control Board Analyst Mike Lawton said that number — $1.038 billion — comes with a caveat. The total was likely fattened up a bit by the fact that Chinese New Year was in January this year but February in 2019. When that happens, January and February have to be analyzed together since Baccarat in particular may be down next month, Nevada Appeal reports.

Lawton said it was a very good month overall because the gains weren’t tied to just Baccarat but spread across the board. Even without Baccarat, statewide win would have been up 4.2 percent for the month.

Nevada sportsbooks had never taken half a billion dollars in wagers in the month of January before, so the record $502.5 million handle was significant. The state’s 192 books also won a total of $20.15 million from bettors, an increase of 36.01 percent from January 2019. The majority of that came from basketball with a win of $12.5 million while the football win was $5.79 million, but that’s to be expected as January has dozens of basketball games every day while the football menu just includes 10 NFL playoff games, the CFB Playoff title game plus the end of the bowl season —the Super Bowl goes on the February ledger.

Game and Table win was up 12.1 percent or $39.5 million to $365.7 million, buoyed by a 17 percent, $16.3 million gain in Baccarat. Blackjack win was up 6.9 percent, Roulette up 17.6 percent and sportsbook win grew by 36 percent compared to a year ago.

Games volume was up 22.8 percent to $2.9 billion. Slots also did well in January, winning $672.5 million, a 2.2 percent gain. Slot win is up 3.2 percent for the fiscal year so far on coin in volume of $9.4 billion, a 6.6 percent growth. The state has not recorded 11 consecutive increases in slot volume.

Lawton said there are two new categories of betting to report as of January. For the first time, he said they broke out mobile sports betting. Turns out bets on phones, tablets and computers made up 49 percent of total sports wagers —$245.8 million of the total $502 million wagered. 

The second new category as of January is hockey betting that he said is now broken out because of Las Vegas’s NHL team, the Golden Knights. Hockey brought in $1.1 million for the casinos during the month on $24.1 million in total wagers.

Las Vegas Strip casinos reported winnings up about 7.5% last month compared with January 2019, and downtown Las Vegas properties were up 13.5%. 

The Carson Valley Area won $8.7 million. That is down 1.9 percent or $163,000 but Lawton said Carson Valley, which includes valley portions of Douglas County as well as the capital, was up against a very difficult comparison since total win was up 9 percent a year ago. Carson has now suffered three consecutive decreases and is down a bit more than a half percent for the fiscal year. The primary culprit was game and table play which was down a fraction over 20 percent ($88,000) on volumes that were down more than 27 percent.

The Tahoe markets were split with North Shore down but South Shore up. North Shore casinos at Crystal Bay reported a decrease of 6.9 percent or $118,000 to $1.6 million. That is the area’s fourth consecutive decrease and the area is now down 6.2 percent for the fiscal year.

But South Shore casinos at Stateline reported a 17.9 percent, $3.1 million increase to $20.2 million. Slot win increased 9.1 percent, $1.2 million. Game and Table win was up 44.4 percent or $1.9 million. Most of that increase, $1.5 million, came form the blackjack tables.

Washoe County reported $65.5 million in win, a 7.8 percent, $4.7 million increase. Lawton credited better weather and an extra weekend day compared to January 2019. Washoe is now up 1.3 percent for the fiscal year.

Finally, Churchill County reported $1,861,000 in total win for the month. That is a 7.48 percent increase over the previous January. The increase came despite a 46 percent decrease in table games, race and sports book win. But those games make up just a tiny percentage of total win in Churchill — some $22,000. That decrease was completely overwhelmed by increases in slot win, particularly the multi-denominational and penny machines.

The state collected $73 million in gambling taxes based on the monthly figure. Casino taxes are second to sales taxes as a percentage of Nevada's annual budget. The state has no personal income tax.