LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — After all the slicing and dicing, all the macro- and the microanalysis, the top executive at Caesars Entertainment says the tourism decline that weighed so heavily on Las Vegas last year wasn’t a big mystery.
“I think this is normal economic cycle activity,” Caesars CEO Tom Reeg said on Tuesday. He added, “There’s really no crisis happening in Vegas.”
Far from dismissing the “soft summer” slump, Reeg and his team have identified what has worked and what hasn’t in the current tourism climate. And they have found that they are doing as good a job as any of the casino giants in providing what their customers want.
Caesars, like many others in the business, is taking advantage of the situation to renovate its properties to make sure customers have something new to see next time they come back: At its flagship Caesars Palace, that means two new presidential villas at the top of the Colosseum Tower, 29 new sky villas at the top of the Octavius Tower, an all new Omnia Dayclub by Tao, a complete remodel of the Augustus Tower and a full renovation of Palace Court, the high-limit table games and salons at the world-class resort. Across the street, the Cromwell is being rebranded to the Vanderpump Hotel. And the shuttered Margaritaville, which faces the Strip outside the Flamingo Las Vegas will be reborn as Category 10 — a project by Luke Combs and Opry Entertainment Group.
Reeg said the Augustus Tower project will take about 1,000 hotel rooms out of service, and renovations will be done when slower business is anticipated.
Those projects were highlighted as Caesars Entertainment disclosed its results for the fourth quarter and for all of 2025.
“If you look back over the history of Caesars in Las Vegas, this is probably the third or fourth best fourth quarter of all time,” Reeg said. At the company’s Las Vegas Strip properties, that meant hotel occupancy was around 92.5% for the quarter across 20,000 rooms.
Caesars Entertainment posted fourth-quarter net revenues of $2.9 billion, up 4.4% over the fourth quarter in 2024. Las Vegas revenues were down 3.4% for the quarter, but the company’s regional casinos covered the difference. Earnings followed a similar pattern, with Caesars bringing in a total of 901 million in the fourth quarter.
For the entire year, Caesars revenue grew to $11.5 billion, a 2.4% increase despite a 4.7% drop in Las Vegas. The company’s regional operations represent a larger share of Caesars business than Las Vegas does. Earnings were $3.6 billion, down 2.7% companywide, and Las Vegas produced $1.7 billion, down 8.6% from 2024.
If it wasn’t the No. 1 quarter and the No. 1 year on the book, and hotel occupancy wasn’t 98%, Caesars had no apologies for the investors who were asking questions.
Instead, Reeg was describing the challenges of the Las Vegas market.
“Peak events, peak weekends, big conferences. The city’s and all of our properties are doing quite well,” he said. “It’s the shoulder periods when there’s not a big event or a big conference where demand is challenging.”
He acknowledged that Caesars, MGM Resorts International, Wynn Resorts International and other players on the Strip weren’t necessarily following the same playbook. Over the past years coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic, resorts have pursued luxury markets as if they are the only way to succeed in Las Vegas. But Reeg doesn’t see it that way.
“I would say premium does hold up better, but I would point you to look at our hotel numbers and look at MGM’s hotel numbers for the quarter. They’re pretty similar. And MGM has a higher skew toward premium rooms, premium properties,” he said.
“It’s not as simple as the low end’s not doing well, the high end’s doing well. That is part of it, but I think also location in the market plays a part. Center Strip has held up better than either end,” Reeg told investors.
“I think it’s too simple to just say premium good, value bad. There’s a little more nuance in there,” he said.
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