Reno’s casino industry posted some of its strongest results on record in June, with gaming win jumping more than 20% and outpacing every other major market in Nevada, even as the Las Vegas Strip saw a decline despite a sharp rise in convention traffic.
According to figures released on Tuesday by the Nevada Gaming Control Board, casinos in Reno generated $81.6m in gaming win for June, a 20.3% year-on-year increase. It was part of a broader surge in Washoe County – which includes Reno and Sparks – where total casino win climbed 17.6% to $107.6m. Across the state, gaming win edged up just 0.8% to $1.34bn.
By contrast, the Las Vegas Strip moved in the opposite direction. Gaming win there slipped 1.4% to $754.7m, contributing to a 0.7% decline in overall Clark County gaming revenue to $1.15bn. Some localised markets in the county still managed gains, with downtown Las Vegas up 2.6% to $75.5m and the Boulder Strip increasing 1.9% to $89m.
Premium play dries up on the Strip
Regulators attributed the Strip’s weaker showing to a drop in premium table play rather than poor luck for casinos. Baccarat win tumbled 19.7% to $102.7m, while the amount wagered on the game fell even more steeply – down 22.2%, or $174.7m, to $610.7m.
Despite the softer baccarat volumes, casinos actually held a slightly higher percentage of money bet across all table games, with the overall hold rate rising to 16.2% from 16% a year earlier. Board analysis indicated the shortfall came mainly from high-end players taking their business elsewhere.
Total win from table, counter and card games on the Strip dropped 4.3% to $330.3m. Slot machines partly offset that decline, with slot win up 1% to $424.4m, limiting the overall downturn in Strip gaming revenue.
Conventions up, visitors and rooms down
The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority reported that convention attendance in June surged 25.8% to an estimated 471,100 people, up from 374,600 a year earlier. However, overall visitor volume across the destination still dipped 0.5% to 3.08 million.
Officials said a robust convention calendar was counterbalanced by a lighter concert and entertainment schedule, resulting in marginally fewer visitors overall than in the same month last year.
The World Cup, staged elsewhere, provided no noticeable boost. Las Vegas did not bid to host any matches, and authority officials, who had hoped the tournament might encourage side trips to the city, reported no measurable uplift in visitor numbers. That was despite the final alone driving nearly $2bn in prediction-market trading and total June volumes on those platforms reaching a record $44.8bn.
Hotel metrics soften on the Strip
Stronger convention numbers also failed to translate into firmer hotel pricing. Strip occupancy in June inched up by 0.3 percentage points to 82.2%, but the average daily room rate fell 5.1% to $165.45. Strip revenue per available room (RevPAR), a key performance indicator for hotels, declined 4.7% to $136.
Across the wider Las Vegas area, destination-wide occupancy slipped to 78.3%, with an average daily rate of $156.32. Downtown properties struggled most, with RevPAR falling 13.4% to $47.39.
Reno closes in on record as investment ramps up
For Reno, June’s $81.6m gaming haul represented the city’s second-best monthly performance on record, trailing only the $83m posted in July 2000. The month also delivered an all-time high slot win of $90m on coin-in of $1.5bn, underscoring the strength of machine play in the market.
Two major capital projects are currently reshaping Reno’s casino landscape. Grand Sierra Resort has begun a multi-phase, $1bn expansion, while J Resort completed the $400m first phase of its renovation in May, signalling renewed long-term investment in northern Nevada.
Over the fiscal year ending 30 June, statewide casino win rose 2.59% to $16.05bn. Reno’s annual total climbed 7.3% to $825.3m, with neighbouring Sparks up 7.2% to $190.9m. The Las Vegas Strip grew more modestly, up 2% to $8.95bn – still a base more than ten times the size of Reno’s market. North Lake Tahoe was the only Nevada market to end the fiscal year lower, with June win there down 5.94% to $2.08m.
Tax collections painted a slightly weaker picture. The state received $81.6m in percentage fees in July on June’s taxable revenue, a 6.99% year-on-year decline, or $6.1m less than the same period last year.
Regulator targets event-contract platforms
Alongside its regular reporting, the Nevada Gaming Control Board is pressing ahead with efforts to keep event-contract and prediction platforms out of the state’s regulated betting market.
Kalshi agreed in a 23 July court filing to implement third-party geofencing across Nevada by 12 August or face penalties of $120,000 per day. The move followed board investigations in which staff repeatedly purchased prohibited sports, election and entertainment contracts from within Nevada despite a May injunction.
The board argued that Kalshi was accepting hundreds of millions of dollars in wagers on events such as the World Cup, the NBA Finals and the Stanley Cup Final while refusing to geofence in the manner required of licensed sportsbooks. Kalshi is now subject to geolocation restrictions in Nevada, Michigan and Washington, as more than 40 states contest the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s claim to exclusive jurisdiction over such markets.
No clear sign yet of lasting Strip slowdown
Regulators cautioned that June’s figures do not yet confirm a prolonged downturn for Las Vegas. For the fiscal year, Strip gaming win remained 2% higher, first-half visitor volumes were up 0.2% and convention attendance rose 12.6%.
Instead, the monthly breakdown suggests a Strip increasingly reliant on volatile premium table play and hotel pricing that no longer rises automatically with a full convention schedule, while smaller northern markets such as Reno post faster percentage gains from a much lower base, underpinned by fresh capital investment.
