Baccarat drives Nevada gaming to its second highest-ever monthly revenue
Nevada’s casinos have flown into 2025, with their second-best-ever monthly total of $1.43bn in January, up 12.5 per cent on last year with The Strip generating its third-best-ever total with GGR of $840m, up from $686m in January 2024.
January’s impressive results brought to an end six consecutive monthly year-on-year declines on the Strip. The Strip’s best ever casino revenue came in December 2023 when $905.3m was registered.
The Nevada Gaming Control Board highlighted how the huge increase was driven by a 121 per cent increase in revenues generated by baccarat on the Strip, which came in at $214.3m in January. Without baccarat, results only increased by 3.7 per cent or $43.3m in January.
Michael Lawton, a senior economic analyst with the Gaming Control Board, explained that there are only 441 baccarat tables in 31 locations in Nevada, making results extremely volatile.
Mr Lawton said: “With that limited footprint the game is not played by masses at every casino in the state. Instead it is played by a limited number of customers who are allowed to wager six-figure amounts per hand. This creates the volatility in year-over-year comparisons due to the fact that it is impossible to determine which players will arrive in a given month and how lucky or unlucky the game will play January’s baccarat win amount is the fourth highest total all-time. Baccarat’s hold percentage was 26.47 per cent vs. 16.13 per cent last year.”
Slot play on The Strip came in at $424.4m, an improvement of 5.9 per cent or $23.7m. Table gaming increased by 33.2 per cent at $524.1m. Nevada sportsbooks won $72.6m, showing an increase of 12.1 per cent.
Elsewhere, other markets that saw increases included North Las Vegas where casino results were up by 5.3 per cent to $23.8m, Mesquite was up 9.7 per cent to $17.3m, Reno increased 2.5 per cent to $67m. Sparks was up 3.3 per cent to $13.5m whilst South Lake Tahoe generated $22.2m, up 22.3 per cent.
Regions that fell in January included Downtown Las Vegas where casinos were down 2.2 per cent at $83.7m. The Boulder Strip’s casinos produced $87.3m, falling 6.2 per cent. Laughlin was down by 4.9 per cent at $42.2m whilst North Lake Tahoe fell 11.1 per cent to $1.9m.
