Carl Icahn Wins Another Bid To Take Over Troubled Casino Project

Carl Icahn has cornered the market on casino bidding. Whether it is a casino in bankruptcy, or a project that is stalled for financial reasons, Icahn has found the key to winning bidding wars with other developers.

This week, Icahn added the defunct Fontainebleau Las Vegas casino project to his stable. Icahn's company, Icahn Enterprises LP won the rights to the project after other offers failed to qualify, according to an examiner put on the case by a US Bankruptcy Court in Miami.

Icahn is not in a hurry to complete the project, instead, he will take his time and examine all of his possibilities. One option would be to look for outside financing, but that would be unlikely considering Icahn's company could finance the completion of the project on their own.

"Right now, we're studying what we should do with it," said Icahn, as reported by The Wall Street Journal, "There's no question right now that Las Vegas is overbuilt, but I believe that eventually demand will catch up or you'll have some older casinos shut down. This is the nature of cycles."

The Las Vegas casino industry has been among the hardest hit by the economic recession in the US. Analysts believe that there will not be a complete recovery until sometime in 2011, giving Icahn time to come up with a plan for the Fontainebleau project.

Last spring construction stopped on the project, causing thousands of workers to lose their jobs. Icahn has been a master at taking financially troubled casinos and projects, and fixing them to a point where he makes a profit on their sale. The Sands in New jersey was one of the property's that Icahn has flipped in the past.

January 20, 2010
Posted By April Gardner
Staff Editor, CasinoGamblingWeb.com
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