When you think of casinos, visions of bright lights, ringing slots, and stacks of chips likely come to mind. These gambling palaces are meant to exemplify luxury, indulgence, and beating the odds. However, even some of the most famous and grandest casinos have faced the brutal reality of bankruptcy and closure.
From the iconic Sands in Atlantic City to the ill-fated Revel Casino Hotel, we'll take a look at 14 of the biggest casino operations that ultimately went bust. The troubled histories of places like Trump's Atlantic City casinos and the legendary Riviera in Las Vegas provide fascinating case studies of how easily even billion-dollar gaming empires can collapse.
While casinos are designed to extract money from patrons, operational costs, competitive pressures, and financial mismanagement have brought many of these gambling giants to their knees over the years. MGM Resorts, Caesars Entertainment, and other corporate titans have felt the sting of staggering losses and restructuring.
First up, the Sands Atlantic City. This place opened in 1980 and seemed poised for success until digging itself into a $1 billion debt hole within 7 years. Yikes, I've had bar tabs smaller than that! They ended up imploding the place in 2007 after years of ownership shuffles didn't fix the money problems. A literal explosive ending for that casino.
Then there's the Atlantic Club Casino Hotel, originally the swanky Golden Nugget opened by Steve Wynn himself in 1980. Regulators didn't see quite eye-to-eye with Wynn, though, and the place changed hands like a hot potato over the decades until filing bankruptcy in 2014. I'm sensing a pattern here of casinos not quite making it in Atlantic City...
Speaking of patterns, how about the Revel Casino Hotel? This place had destructive tendencies from the start, filing for bankruptcy twice in its extremely short two-year lifespan from 2012 to 2014 before closing down. Two bankruptcies in a two-year run are impressively catastrophic, even for me.
Harrah's in Tunica didn't do much better, going for the long burn of "seven consecutive years of year over year declines," according to their own VP before closing in 2014. That's some masterful managing there, really dragging things out.
The Lucky Dragon Las Vegas showed all the business smarts of, well, me on a lucky day. Despite government subsidies (?!), this place managed to fire 20% of its staff within a year of its grand opening before closing the casino side just 15 months later and filing bankruptcy in 2018. At least it was appropriately named.
How about Trump's casinos filing for bankruptcy? I can, unfortunately, relate to The Donald's financial woes all too well. His company racked up $1.8 billion in debt at one point, which is just sad. Even for a guy with a building obsession like Trump, that's an absurd amount of dollar bills to be flushing down the toilet repeatedly.
Then you've got Caesars Entertainment, the biggest casino operator in the country, filing for bankruptcy in 2015. They managed to erase $10 billion of debt through some legal loophole trickery that I'm definitely taking notes on. If only I could declare bankruptcy that easily on my Venmo debts.
The Riviera in Las Vegas has an appropriately dramatic history - it filed for bankruptcy in its opening year of 1955! From then until its demolition in 2016, it changed hands more times than I changed my socks. And it was entangled with mobsters to boot. Now, that's a bankruptcy story I can get behind.
Then, take the saddest case of the Showboat in Atlantic City. This place was somehow still profitable in 2014, but the parent company, Harrah's, shut it down anyway just to give its other casinos a boost. Talk about kicking a money-making operation while it's up! I respect that total lack of chill.
Now, we have the Aladdin casino filing a $1.2 billion bankruptcy in 2001. A magic act making over a billion dollars disappear - now that's some impressive sleight of hand! I need to acquire skills like that to manage my finances.
How about SLS Las Vegas, which opened in 2014 after replacing the Sahara? This place was such a disaster it lost money every single year until 2017 and was staring bankruptcy in the face. It's a good thing they had the wisdom to switch back to the Sahara name in 2019 - maybe a re-brand could revive my financial fortunes, too!
Then there's MGM Resorts, a name that sounds like it should ooze wealth, except for that stretch from 2008 to 2015 when they lost a casual $3 billion across those 8 years. $3 billion?! I didn't even know that amount of money existed until barreling towards it in debt. No wonder they had to sell off properties like the Bellagio just to keep the lights on.
We can't forget Terrible's casino either, and their fittingly-named 2009 bankruptcy. In my personal experience, terribleness often does precede bankruptcy, so that tracks. Maybe an omen I should have heeded.
Finally, a shoutout to Tropicana Entertainment going bankrupt, which is basically my default setting whenever I open a pina colada beer at 9 am on a Wednesday. That paradisiacal name triumphed by cold capitalistic reality? Feels like a metaphor for my life.
So my entire life I thought casinos would be making money handover fist, no? Well, that's all about my list of 14 biggest casinos that went bankrupt. Comforting to know I'm not alone in my delightful propensity for financial ruin. Maybe don't mortgage your future to me, is all I'm saying.
Maybe I'll find a casino of my own and really take this failure thing full circle! Who's investing?
