The NYSGC has expressed “serious” concerns about Genting and MGM’s bids for a downstate New York casino license. [Image: Shutterstock.com]

Favorites’ wings clipped

The New York State Gaming Commission (NYSGC) has expressed “serious” misgivings about the two favorites insiders believe will win two of the three licenses available to operate a casino in downstate New York. 

first time the NYSGC is “publicly expressing concern”

According to the Las Vegas Review-Journal on Tuesday, it’s the first time the NYSGC is “publicly expressing concern” about multiple applicants. 

In the firing line for their high-profile scandals in Las Vegas are three firms. Two of them have existing New York gaming footprints that, at least until now, gave them the advantage over the near dozen other bidders.   

At recent NYSGC meeting, Chairman Brian O’Dwyer publicly voiced misgivings over two bids, namely from the Genting Group and Wynn Resorts, “for various violations of the law” in Las Vegas. 

“These allegations are serious,” the exec stated.

While O’Dwyer didn’t directly mention MGM Resorts, Genting’s fellow favorite for a downstate casino license, it also has a history of Las Vegas violations that could potentially hijack its bid.

Skeletons in the closet

The fact O’Dwyer didn’t single out MGM directly shouldn’t give the firm too much hope. The latest aspersions cast by the NYSGC come “almost exactly a year after multiple unnamed sources told various media outlets” that Vegas-based scandals could harm MGM’s New York bid. 

Because MGM runs Empire City Casino in Yonkers, it was a license favorite among industry experts and insiders along with Genting, which owns Resorts World New York City at Aqueduct Race Track in Queens.

In August, the Nevada Gaming Control Board (NGCB) alleged Genting’s Resorts World Las Vegas casino was a haven for criminal activity, while filing a 12-count disciplinary complaint against it.

The NGCB’s allegations against the Malaysia-headquartered Genting’s subsidiary include six counts of the Las Vegas Strip casino giving out “hundreds of thousands of dollars in credit to others with histories of illegal gambling convictions or organized crime.”

O’Dwyer also singled out Las Vegas-headquartered Wynn. Last month, the gambling giant agreed to forfeit $130m to the feds under a “non-prosecution agreement” regarding a decade-long case relating to unlicensed global money transactions from Wynn Las Vegas.

Slipping away?

Both Genting and MGM had their eyes on securing a NY class III gaming license so they could add live dealer games to their respective Queens and Yonkers venues, and move away from “video lottery terminals to random-number-generator slot machines.”

But the NYSGC’s allegations will affect the favorites’ bids and give renewed hope to the rest of the field, including New York Mets owner Steve Cohen and Hard Rock International’s bid for a casino resort complex adjacent to Citi Field in Queens.

political pressure from within

According to the Review-Journal, in less than 24 hours New York Governor Kathy Hochul went from allegedly backing the Cohen/Hard Rock bid to not backing it at all because of political pressure from within her own administration.