April gaming down in Churchill County

Despite one of the busiest events calendars in a long time, gaming win was down in April by 2.4 percent.

Total win of $876.1 million equates to about $21.9 million less than April.

Events in Southern Nevada included The Park from New York New York to the Monte Carlo, the opening of the T-Mobile Arena and concerts by Guns and Roses, George Strait, Lionel Richie, Rihanna and Billy Joel, a Manny Pacquiao fight, a UFC title fight and the opening of a new night club in the Wynn.

But about $30 million of April’s slot win won’t be reported until the May report because April ended on a Saturday.

Baccarat was actually up in April, only the fourth monthly increase in the last 12. The increase was only $9.5 million, but that game still accounted for a third of the total Game and Table win of $308.6 million.

Slot win was the problem, falling 5.7 percent to $567.4 million in April. For the calendar year, slot play is off by four-tenths of a percentage point.

In Churchill County, total gaming win was down 2.5 percent to $1.69 million in April.

That decrease came despite an almost 20 percent increase in table game win. Table games, however, make up just $63,000 of that total in the four out of 10 locations that offer them. Over the past 12 months, Churchill casinos are up 1 percent over the previous year.

The Carson Valley Area, which includes valley portions of Douglas County, fell 4.7 percent in April to $8.1 million. Both table games and slots were down, games win by 8.4 percent. But table games make up only a small piece of Carson Valley gaming win. Carson Valley also faced a tough comparison since April 2015 was up 6.7 percent over the previous April.

Washoe County had a banner month with total win of $66.2 million. That’s a 15.5 percent increase over the same month in 2015, a difference of $8.9 million. Both slot play and table games were up double digits.

North Shore casinos at lake Tahoe were up 3.8 percent — about $50,000. But the previous April was a 16.5 percent decrease, giving those casinos an easy comparison. This is north shore’s fourth consecutive month of increases and, for the calendar year, the reporting area is up 13.5 percent.

South Shore Casinos at Stateline had a bad month. They were down 12.5 percent to $12.7 million total win.

But a year ago, those casinos reported a 60 percent increase in win. Even so, for the calendar year, south shore casinos are up 5.7 percent.