Casinos Still Reeling From Atlantic City Shutdown
The shutdown that the New Jersey budget impasse entailed was a huge pain for the casino gaming industry in Atlantic City.
One of the most hard hit by the crisis were the Trump casinos, and Donald Trump has spoken about the unfortunate event. Trump owns Atlantic City's Trump Marina, Trump Plaza, and Trump Taj Mahal casinos.
"It will take a while to recover from something like this," Trump said yesterday. "It will have lingering effects that will be far-reaching."
"There was nothing to learn from this," Trump, who was filming The Apprentice in Los Angeles, said. "It's too bad it had to happen."
The shutdown couldn't have been more ill-timed as July was the host month to last year's record gambling revenues. The recent shutdown has generated doubts about Wall Street's confidence in New Jersey's casino industry as casino stocks dropped in light of the government shutdown.
Casinos in town lost substantial revenues together with small businesses that depend on them after the shutdown took effect Wednesday morning. Restaurants closed, valet parking ceased, car rentals had no customers, even bus operators as far as Staten Island felt the ripple effect of the crisis.
Based on July 2005 earnings, the 12 casinos will have lost an estimated $48 million in gambling profits in the few days that they were forced to stop operations.
"It is a colossal failure by government - a disaster," said Mark Juliano, chief operating officer of Trump Entertainment Resorts.
"Do you really want to commit billions of dollars if you have to worry about this every year?" said Larry Klatzkin, gambling industry analyst and managing director of New York-based Jefferies and Co.
"They need us to come back," said Eric Maurice, 45, of New York City. Maurice is a guest at Caesar's. "The dealers aren't making any money; the employees aren't making tips."
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