CEO: Caesars not selling Planet Hollywood, or any Vegas property

Denise Truscello / Getty Images for Caesars Entertainment

Showgirls welcome visitors to Planet Hollywood as it reopens Oct. 8, 2020, in Las Vegas.

Tom Reeg, the chief executive officer of Caesars Entertainment, has seen the social media and blog posts saying Planet Hollywood in Las Vegas is for sale.

His response: That’s bad information.

“I’ve read a lot of comments about how we’re about to sell Planet Hollywood,” Reeg said. “If whoever knows what’s happening there can call me and tell me what we’re getting, I’d appreciate it. There are no assets for sale in Las Vegas in our portfolio.”

Reeg said the company wouldn’t entertain selling any of its nine Las Vegas properties until 2022 at the earliest. It will make more sense for Caesars to sell a resort once business levels — which have been hampered by the pandemic — pick up, he said.

“I want to be marketing that asset off actual performance under our stewardship, not having to build a bridge from what it’s doing today versus what we think it will be doing,” Reeg said in a quarterly earnings call.

The report detailed a companywide net loss of $555 million in the fourth quarter of 2020. By comparison, it had a net loss of $13 million during the pre-pandemic fourth quarter period in 2019.

Caesars reported revenues of about $447 million in the Las Vegas market, which represented a 55% drop from what was reported in Las Vegas for the fourth quarter of 2019.

“We’ve got a lot of wood to chop in Las Vegas as it reopens, but we’re seeing encouraging signs,” Reeg said. “The demand that’s coming as the world reopens is wildly underestimated by the markets. In Las Vegas, we’re at our highest level of bookings since reopening — it’s almost as if a switch was flipped in late January and early February.

On Saturday, Reeg said 95% of Caesars’ Strip hotel rooms were occupied, though he admitted that room rates are lower than what they normally would be.

“Importantly, the booking window is extending,” Reeg said. “From (June) until the end of 2020, it seemed like there were a lot of impulse trips with short booking windows. Now, almost half of our bookings are for trips that are planned at least 30 days out. We’re extremely encouraged by that.”

The company forecasts that its mid-week Strip hotel bookings will reach the 50% mark next month while the weekend percentage is expected to be 95% or better, Reeg said.

Reeg said group travel business in Las Vegas — which is largely driven by convention and trade show visitors — isn’t likely to pick up until later in the year, though he said he’s also optimistic about that segment.

In normal times, Reeg said group travel business represents about 15% of the company’s revenues.

“We know there’s a lot of discussion and debate about when the world will reopen,” Reeg said. “We’re certainly heartened by what we’re seeing with the vaccine advances and coming supply. We’re heartened by Gov. (Steve) Sisolak in Nevada providing us a path where we could be hosting group business in earnest by the middle of this year.”

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