So our lunch keynote is going to be Bill Hornbuckle, President and Chief Executive Officer of MGM Resorts. MGM has long been a sponsor of this conference in all of its various forms. And I actually got asked the other day by my new associate, you know, "Well, is this the biggest one of these conferences you've ever done?" And I said, "Well, you know, in New York, absolutely." But then I had to think for a second.
I was like, "Well, there was this one time back in Las Vegas, in 2010, and there was this epic conference that was held, and all because of the sponsorship of MGM and the relationship that we've had over the years." And they've been a huge sponsor of mine, pretty much from day one, as a research analyst. So, it means a lot. It's actually been the first year in a couple of years that we've had you back, so real pleasure to have you here, and a lot going on, both globally, here in New York. So excited to hear all about it.
So the way this is going to work, we're going to do about 20, 25 minutes, where Bill's going to give some prepared remarks, and he has a few slides to walk through, and give us an update on the way he sees the world. And then from there, we'll do—we'll jump into a fireside chat. So Bill, over to you. Thank you for doing this.
Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you, Shaun. So, maybe as just a quick intro to myself, because I've met many of you, but some of you I haven't. I wanted to talk a little bit about the company, how we view it, frankly, how I view it as the new President and CEO, at least since you've all had a chance to recoup after COVID. And there are five basic pillars and disciplines. And I think to start this off, I think something that's really relevant is we put the vision and the hospitality and servige as a priority and priority one. We see ourselves as an entertainment company, and I come from 45 years of being with the company. I've been with it... Not with the company in Las Vegas.
I've been with the company a little over 25 years, and so I know the nature of it. I know the nature of the people. I've literally had 50 different jobs in this industry, and so when I talk about strong people and strong culture, it comes from a place of being there and having done it. And so frankly, we get credibility with our organization. And so pushing the needle on all of that is exceptionally important to me and to us, and it comes with a couple basic premises. We consider and we listen to our customers, and we listen often to our employees, just about everything. And so the idea of listening to them, I think, is essential and fundamental to who and what we are. We're servant leaders. We truly believe that.
While we run a big company, we have an amazing opportunity, both in Las Vegas and other places in the world. We are there to lead a group of people to do something that's pretty special and pretty unique. We are customer-centric more than we have ever been. Won't surprise any of you that 70% of our top line comes from 30% of our customers. And so we have keenly focused on what we call our Gold Plus customers and above, which are basically tied to our rewards program and our high-spend, non-gaming individuals, where we have special programs. And so we have leaned into that in a big way, particularly in all of our luxury brands. We talked about and we have a vision for gaming as entertainment.
You're going to see some numbers in a moment about scale, about the entertainment company we are and the things that we do, but the opportunity and the vision for us. And if you think about this, think about a casino and what it was 75 years ago. Think about it today when you walk in. It kind of feels and looks the same when you think about the core product. And so we have a view that through digitization, through the opportunity to broadcast, we can do some things differently. And so when we think about gaming, we think about the notion of entertainment. We literally want to bring it down to that core level, and I'll spend some more time talking about that. We think about operational excellence. I've been with the company, like I said, 25 years.
It's not lost on me that about five or six years ago, in the context of margins, we lost our roadmap. We, post-COVID, have gotten very focused. We're down 15% FTEs. We're very focused on margins and what it means to all of you as investors and frankly, to us as stakeholders. And so you'll hear a little bit more about that, but it's a key, key focus of our team going forward and about disciplined capital allocation. You all know we've gone asset light. You all know that we probably sit on about $3.5 billion in cash with additional credit facility that pushes us up to $5 billion. We're proud of the M&A that we have done. When you take the Cosmopolitan deal and you combine it with Mirage and Gold Strike, that was over a 40% accretive deal to us on an ROI.
So we're proud of the M&A that we've done. We've stayed focused on our balance sheet. We're very focused on free cash going forward, and I'll spend some more time talking about that, going forward as well. If you think about what is this... Somebody asked me a question this morning: "What are you trying to do?" And we talked about, and you'll, you'll hear from Adam later, talked about DraftKings as a pure play in digital sports betting and gaming. We're not a pure play, so what is it that MGM Resorts is trying to do, particularly when it relates to things like the digital space? You can see our footprint.
The idea is to have a balanced portfolio and a balanced approach so that when anyone thinks about gaming as an enterprise and an investment, MGM has to come to the forefront because we have a massive presence in Las Vegas, arguably the capital of gaming. We have an Asian presence in Macau and one that's growing in Japan. We have a regional presence in the United States that's diversified and now through LeoVegas and ultimately our BetMGM platform here in the States, we have a position in digital gaming that ultimately is growing and we think substantially into the near future. And so you can see the footprint and the idea around omni-channel, and what we think it brings us in the long run, we think is meaningful, and so that's what we're trying to accomplish there.
When you think about scale and scope, and, you know, these are some of our numbers, a couple of things maybe to point out of interest. We sold over 9 million tickets last year. Other than Live Nation, AEG, that makes us the third largest in the country. So our ability to buy, to attract, to get, to motivate, to sponsor in that space is huge. When you think about restaurants, you go down, there's in the market reach category, we're the largest multi-concept non-chain F&B operator in the United States. We do over $1 billion in F&B. We have over 460 restaurants, and most of them all are independent ideas, one after the other. And so we have huge buying power. We have the ability to lean in.
When you think about the state of Nevada, we're the state's largest taxpayer, and so we have leverage and sourcing to lean into all of that based on the scale that sits before you. When you think about the strategic direction we're going, go back to my earlier comments. Obviously, we have nine core properties in Las Vegas that run the spectrum from luxury down to legacy properties that speak to the economy segment, whether it's Excalibur or Luxor. We have seven regional properties, all of which you know. Three of them really operate like full-scale resorts when you think about Borgata, when you think about the Beau, when you think about National Harbor. We have a growing presence in Macau. We're now enjoying, you'll see later, about 14% market share, and so we've enjoyed that rebound, and I think exceptionally well.
We, as you know, we have a 50% stake in BetMGM, and we'll speak more extensively about that. And so midterm, and then you've all heard, Chris Nassetta was just giving me a hard time about our deal with Marriott. We're really excited by that. We think it's a substantive deal. We've seen what it's done to the Cosmopolitan and for the Cosmopolitan. It was one of the reasons that attracted us to it, and so our ability to leverage into that as we go forward, and that will start in late October with MGM, and by year-end, we'll be fully integrated in a technology platform into that programming, we're excited by. If you think about the company longer term, you think about Empire City and the growth that will happen here, and I'll talk about that.
You think about MGM Resorts and its 40% ownership in Japan, where literally the end of this month, I'm finally going to go sign the implementation agreement and the lease and get that project underway, and I'll tell you more about the timing. Then long-term digital growth. You saw us go international with LeoVegas. We just bought a company called Push Gaming, and the idea there is a content provider that can help us push content not only into Leo, potentially into BetMGM, and ultimately the idea of convergence of brick-and-mortar and digital, so that we can offer products like game-changing jackpots that stretch across digital and land-based and leverage all of that. And so something like Push Gaming helps us accomplish that. In terms of earnings, obviously, you all know the second quarter earnings.
I think the message is, particularly as we look at the luxury segment in Las Vegas, it remains strong. Two weeks ago, we had our highest ADR booking week in our history. Now you're leaning into the fourth quarter, you're leaning into Formula One, which is a unique... It won't be a one-off event, but a unique event. People are starting to get excited by Super Bowl. We just was able to capture the NBA tournament and a special tournament they're going to have the first week of December. So there's a lot of activity driving it, but the bottom line, in the middle of August, ADRs continued to drive Las Vegas. What it means macro for RevPAR in the general economy, I think, time to tell, but the signs that we see are encouraging. We consistently contain the margins.
We promised you all 400-600 basis points improvement, and we've sustained that, and we're going to continue to be highly focused on that. And I think this quarter, it well proved it out. As we think about the third quarter and ultimately into the fourth, we see that sustaining itself. Regional is kind of a mixed bag. Obviously, this is the place where any downturn in the economy might show the most. It's an interesting story we have in places like the Beau Rivage and Borgata, they had the best August in their history. Just had the best months in their history in August. You have Empire that did not, and you think about that. Well, why? Well, Empire's 90% of its audience is within 15 miles.
You look at the other two properties, and they're destination resorts, of which we put people in airplanes and bring them in. So our regional properties don't behave necessarily like other folks' portfolio, but they're interesting unto themselves. They provide this huge amount of throughput back into Las Vegas. So much so that now we've been able to capture 30% casino mix in Las Vegas, where historically we've won 20. So that's been one of the dynamic changes of what's happened to Las Vegas and why that marketplace and, and why we're doing so well there. And then there's the China story. You've all seen it. Look, we were really active and busy during COVID. There are several things we did. We added a bunch of suites that we needed desperately. We're still under suite.
We want more, but we added a bunch of suites that have proved accretive. We were able to make a submission to the government that we were the only ones to get additional tables. We picked up 200 tables. We put 150 of them to work already, and we're pushing through to get the other 50 in play. And so we've been able to go from a 9.5% share to just under a 15% share, about 14.5%. And I think it's sustainable. We're now into our third quarter, and we're sustaining it. We've changed the makeup of the way the floor works, and I'll show you that in a moment. And so I think the approach we've taken, our reliance on our own marketing engine, where others have relied on junkets historically, has proven effective.
And so we're at a different place than we were when we went in, coming out of COVID than when we went into COVID. You can see this interesting statistic for Macau. August, for the first time, visitation hit 100% of last August of 2019. So the market has fully recovered in the context of visitation. We got a head start on it, and you can see on the right what it did to our GGRs. We were, for the second quarter, already at 100%, most leveraged into Cotai, which was underdeveloped as we were going into COVID. We had just started to ramp that property up. But you can see what happens.
Some of those pictures are hard to see, but the essence of it is we took out some of the specialty high-end areas, opened them up to the floor, added additional tables, and enabled customers to look at each other. But this is important, that they could look at each other, see the tables close to them, and they could walk around, and if they felt a trend, they could move to the next table. And as funny as that sounds, it is working so much so that the entire marketplace now is starting to copy that idea. But we were on it, and you can say we've been rewarded by it. The other thing is obviously the push into non-gaming tourism by the government itself....
We've committed close to $1 billion between now and the next 9.5 years to push into this space. We started several different programs. One of them, though, was a concert series. This is on the top of the Cotai roof, out on a patio we have. We just hosted this weekend, 5,000 folks, and we're pretty excited by it—two weekends ago, excuse me. We're pretty excited by what happened here. And then you can see again, the share, and this is in the face of 10,000 additional rooms have opened since the beginning of the year. You had a bunch of rooms opening at Galaxy. You had a bunch of rooms at the Sands open because they had some labor issues that they finally got their head around.
And so we've gone from a place of 9.5% to about 14.5%, and the message is, I think it's sustainable. And generally, in Macau, as I think about the next couple of months, other than the typhoon we just all survived successfully, we have not seen a downturn. So if you think about macro, everything you hear, real estate, economy, we have not seen a downturn in Macau. Doesn't mean it won't come. We have yet to see it. We think it's a pretty unique marketplace. And remember, about Macau, there's only 1% penetration of customers into Macau from China, so the marketplace is just massive. Adam will speak more to this.
I think he's presenting after our conversation here today, but BetMGM, particularly for the first half of the year, continues to do what it was intended to do. We committed to between $1.8 billion and $2 billion in GGR. It's accomplished that. I think most importantly to us, you can see our cohorts maturing. And so in the older markets, we see that we're able to make money, and you've seen that in the results. We made money in the second quarter. We'll see what happens in the third quarter, but the push and the understanding is next year we'll be money-making, and we, as investors, don't see any substantive reinvestment into the business at scale. And again, I'll leave most of this for Adam to speak to. Talking about midterm growth, Las Vegas, think about macro.
This is air traffic and air seats available into Las Vegas, and ever... If you go all the way back to January of 2021 and the recovery, we surpassed 19, and as we sit here today in anticipation of the fall season, we've got 20% more seats than the market's ever had before in its history. Fundamentally, airlift is there for our programming. Interestingly, a great deal of it is domestic, low-end carriers that are value-oriented, and it's driving tourism at an unprecedented level. You can see that. The other thing that's been interesting is we continue as a marketplace to open markets. In this last quarter, we've opened three, excuse me, Lexington, Lincoln, and San Jose. You can see the international markets that have been announced and the domestic markets that have been announced.
The point is the marketplace, the seat capacity, and the interest continue to grow into Las Vegas, and I think fundamentally, as we think about the future, it's encouraging. The other thing, obviously, F1, you all know about it. I will tell you, rates are about 4x normal. I will tell you, gaming advance front money credit is at 50% above the highest event in our history, and we've got about 7 weeks to go. So think Pacquiao-Mayweather, think about front money and credit. Now, it doesn't mean we're going to win, by the way. It's a weekend. Anything can happen. But front money and credit, we're 50% higher than any event in the history of the company. Pretty compelling. If you've seen the infrastructure, for any of you who have been on the ground there, they put in play, this thing isn't going anywhere.
They've got hundreds and hundreds of millions invested in a paddock and start-finish line. The track is ready to go. We literally, this is in front of Bellagio, we're building this out as we speak. We're going to put in the fountains, 12,000 seats. You have a VIP club, you'll have a lounge, and you'll have an updeck patio. So pretty exciting stuff. We're all excited by this event. When it comes to... Did I go by one? Allegiant, we're scheduled to have 24 programmed event activity. It's up to 42. This thing continues to marvel. We just finished two weekends ago, not Taylor Swift, but Beyoncé. And so the programming here, think, remembering, this is in our backyard, literally 65... matter of fact, you can see them on the bridge.
65% of the people who come to this venue walk, and so we are the south end of the Strip. We find that compelling. You've all heard about this. This is literally the location of the A's new stadium, and it's kind of hard to believe in some respects for us. If they put this roof on like they've defined, that will be the backdrop. And so if you look at it from that perspective, that's a better view. And so literally, on those four corners, you're going to have MGM, New York-New York, Excalibur, the balance of our properties, and the stadium right there. That'll drive about 450,000 new visitors a year, and that's being conservative, I think, but if the A's continue to do what they're doing, they'll get a better team. Time will tell. We hope. We think they will. They better.
But the additional programming that can happen in that venue, we also find exceptionally compelling. So that's there. And then if you think about it in its totality for a moment, and you just take a step back, and I now begin to call this the Golden Triangle of Sports. You've got Allegiant, you've got T-Mobile, which, by the way, the NBA just announced the programming for a mid-season tournament. They're going to bring eight teams out the first weekend in December to T-Mobile. And so every year, hopefully, every year, we're going to have a mid-season tournament, and you're going to have where Tropicana sits, ultimately, the A's stadium. So if you think about that and the proximity to who and what we are, you can't but be excited by the activity case that all generates.
This is more of the same. You know, we continue down the track of, you know, both between world-class entertainment and the various venues and the hype. Continue to be the home of UFC, continue to support and sponsor the Vegas Golden Knights, who obviously won the Cup, and so that, you know, that continues to be productive, particularly in midweek when Canada's in town. You'll see 5, 6, 7 thousand people sitting in the stands. It's kind of an interesting dynamic.... And then ultimately, the Marriott deal I mentioned earlier. We think this deal drives roughly, when it stabilizes, about 750,000 room nights. If you think of it, the vast majority of these people are redeeming points, so in essence, their room is free.
And so what we've seen at the Cosmopolitan is it displaces lower-end business so that the differentiate between what's being charged to the—to, ultimately, the Marriott, and a leisure rate, and then the fact that they're there and not paying for a room, and so everything in their pocket from a RevPOR perspective, rooms, food, beverage, entertainment, simply goes up. It just does. It's the nature of psyche. It's what people have done at the Cosmopolitan. And so if we can stretch this across their 180 million members, across our particular Las Vegas portfolio... But I'll tell you, in Borgata, I think this will be meaningful and maybe even as far south as the BO, but particularly in Borgata, I think this has some meaning to it. So we're extremely excited by that program.
Down the road, but this has now become not a dream, but I think a possibility and a real one. Brightline has a proposal that literally sits on Secretary Buttigieg's desk as we speak. They're looking for up to $3 billion from the government to sponsor this. Brightline would run from Southern California to Las Vegas. They have the land acquisition. They have all the environmentals in place. They are simply now waiting for this funding to drop. And I got to think, if you go back to the Biden administration and think about how they've talked about rail and high speed, this is the kind of program that could fit into that very, very squarely. And frankly, I think it's waiting for a political moment for him to say, "And oh, by the way, we are doing this." So we're pretty excited.
Now, it's a long-term view. This is probably a 10-year build, but it will greatly impact the viability of the I-15. It literally goes right down the I-15 corridor. It goes right down the middle of I-15, principally the whole way. We continue to reinvest. From anyone who's been down to Atlantic City, we renamed the Water Club the MGM Tower. We reinvested in the rooms. Those rooms had become tired, so we reinvested in all of those rooms. We continue to reinvest in places like Bellagio. If I told you the trailing 12-month cash flow, EBITDA on Bellagio was $700 million, you'd have to believe me, and so it's a meaningful number in an environment we want to protect.
So we've redone all of the rooms, with the exception of the suites in the main tower, which we are redoing now. We've redone three of the restaurants, we've redone the casino, we're working on Baccarat. We're adding a couple of amenities. This happens to be a high-end room called The Vault. It's a speakeasy. For $50, I'll serve you a cocktail. And we're hoping to make it literally one of the 50th best bars in the world. I'm not kidding you, by the way, 50th best bars in the world. But just, you know, the ideas, we're continuing to reinvest. These are the rooms in the Spa Tower in Bellagio. The other idea we have, particularly now acquiring Cosmopolitan, is the idea of a luxury campus.
And so many of you probably haven't been back here because we just opened this, but this is the new corridor. Remember, there was this concrete corridor that went between Vdara and the back end of Bellagio? We've just now opened this, and this now tees into the Cosmopolitan as well. And so we've figured out how to hard connect the back end of the building, and now, frankly, I'm working on the front end because we now own the sliver of land as well that separated the Cosmopolitan property from the Bellagio property. And so you'll see us come forward with an idea to ultimately push all these things together, so from a customer perspective, they can stay interior and stay on our campus, if you will, on something we want to market collectively as a luxury campus.
Oh, and then the last one, and this had an impact this year. Our convention business was off. One of the reasons, we lost about 100,000 room nights at Mandalay because we were redoing the facility. It is now done or finishing up, and so as we think about this fall season, conventions and into next year, we have this facility done. It hadn't been done in almost 15 years, so it was time. And so we're excited because it gives us the ability to go do back-to-back conventions. Without the space during renovation, we can only kind of do one at a time. As I think about long-term growth, here in New York is one of our opportunities. Good news is, two weeks ago, we finally got our response back from our first questions, which actually starts a program.
So we had submitted over 80 questions to the government, the gaming commission. They've now responded back. That starts the clock. We then have now made a second submission. Well, by October sixth, we need to make a second submission. We've made it, but by October sixth, you need to make a second submission. They will then respond at their choosing and when they choose, but I can't imagine they would have responded to the first, not realizing the second was going to come. It's our hope and belief that we'll have made an RFA submission, the actual submission for a license, by end of this year. Then you need localization, so that's really becoming the trick. In terms of zoning, you need to have zoning, and you need localization.
I think the mayor here is trying to get, interestingly, a revision to the zoning laws, but you cannot do this without local community support. We have local community support, and so you're looking at about a $2 billion extension. That's a large theater. Think Park Theater. That's a 3,500-space parking garage. There's no structured parking currently. We're going to revamp the whole thing, reskin it, add a couple restaurants. We'll end up ultimately with about 200-plus table games and about 4,500 slot machines. I'm hoping, and I don't know, that by this time next year, we've been given a license. I think that's a rational and reasonable expectation, but we'll see.
Frankly, it'll probably get held up or not by this third license and how quickly that can happen, whether it's here in Manhattan or some other... or one of the boroughs. Japan, this has been a journey. I was born in Japan, by the way, so I have an affinity for it. I was born on an Air Force base, not that I'm Japanese, but I've spent 12 years on this project. Finally, on September 29th, I'm supposed to get on an airplane, go to Japan, sign the final two agreements, the implementation agreement and the lease for the property. That means we can start in earnest, and to the extent we're able to do that, this will open in 2030.... $10 billion project. Budget has not changed. Scope has changed, budget has not changed. I won't let the scope, the budget change.
Earning potential has not changed. We haven't impacted the casino itself. And, I think, you know, if you think about the marketplace, we're probably going to be the only casino for a very long time in Japan. You've got 100 million people, you've got 19 million in Osaka alone. The casino industry there, that-not the- the gaming industry there is $40 billion. Osaka alone is $19 billion of it. Whether you think about pachinko, you think about boats, you think about horse races, we're going to be the only casino. I'm extremely excited by the, the potential of this, and the kicker is, it is closer to Shanghai, Beijing, and Northern China cities than Macau. And so if you think about that, our database, who we know, what we know, how we do it, we're pretty excited by that opportunity as well.
And then ultimately, the UAE, fascinating opportunity. This is a project that we started back in 2015, long before the dialogue started on casinos in the UAE. The idea, this is Porto Island. You're looking at Jumeirah Beach to the right. If I was, well, where I am standing, this would be the Burj Al Arab, the hotel that looks like a sail, and right to the left of it's Palm Island. This is a 25-acre site that has been created. We're in the ground now with pylons. This is designed to be a hotel-only project initially. You're looking at an Aria and that Bellagio and an MGM, about 1,500 keys. We have recently added a 150,000 sq ft platform, one additional layer to this thing, to either be one of two things, a casino or a retail center.
What has to happen here is each ruler will rule whether they want gaming or not, once potentially, the country ultimately opines and puts out its regulations, which it appears well-positioned. You probably saw some announcements earlier this week about all of that, my predecessor of note. And so we're excited by it. We've been on this actually since 2015. Oh, by the way, the owner of this is the ruler of the Emirate, so that helps. Group called Wasl. It's part of his portfolio and part of his holdings. But, you know, we will wait for Dubai. We will wait to hopefully have this become a reality, and, you know, we see this as a $3+ billion market opportunity, and so we'll see. And we think Dubai has 140,000 hotel rooms today.
Dubai today is as big as Las Vegas, and the potential on this longer term, we think, is pretty compelling. That is in the ground as we speak. Obviously, ultimately, digitally, Adam will talk about BetMGM and our partnership here. You've seen us push in the LeoVegas and rest of world. We just bought this company called Push Gaming, which is a content provider, principally around iGaming. You saw, and many of you have asked questions this morning, about our launch with BetMGM into the U.K., designed, frankly, to test the brand, to understand the value of our brand. We know from an international visitation perspective, other than Canada, it's our number one market, and if we're ever going to have a test of the value of our brand, we think this is the place to do it.
Shaun, I think that's it, if you want to-
Love to.
Go to Q&A?
All right. Sorry. Perfect. Thanks. You know, I've seen a lot of, a lot of MGM decks over the years, but there's some new, some, some really new material in here, Bill. It's really exciting. So thank you for, thank you for doing that. We did miss the sizzle reel. Like, where's the big, you know, the Katy Perry song or whatever we lead off with, right? Like, missed that a little bit.
We'll focus.
So, you know, look, a lot of different places we could start. I want to be thoughtful on time, but maybe, you know, we ended on digital, so let me start with digital and just kind of hit on a couple things. And obviously, I'm going to keep a lot of the operational and detailed questions for Adam and Gary in a few minutes. But from MGM's perspective, kind of two things I wanted to touch on: First, so LeoVegas just launched in the UK. And obviously, you know, they're a European company, you know, you have the rights to the BetMGM brand, but it is also the home market for your JV partner over there. So I'm sure you've thought about that and the strategy behind that. It's also a really competitive market.
So just kind of walk us through the thinking there. Is there any signal we should be thinking or not? We know it's a big market, so just, yeah, just help us think through that, just from-
No, I... Look, I wouldn't read a signal. We've been clear with Entain, our partner, since day one, that we have international aspirations. Go back to the strategy around the company and full diversification. In making a couple hundred million dollars in digital, give or take, whatever the number's going to be, isn't enough to drive a differentiator in how people might view the company and ultimately maybe change valuations. We want and need to be a digital player at scale. We've been clear about that since day one. We've been clear that BetMGM is for the use of the North-- for US and for Ontario. When we launched and did LeoVegas, we let them know that at some point, BetMGM would emerge.
As we thought about it, and we thought about, well, where can we trial, particularly the brand? Because we think the environment that's been created and the product itself will be great and fine, hopefully better, time to tell, but to your point, it's a huge market with a lot of established players. It's not going to be easy to break into. We really want to test the, the validation of the brand and see if it's meaningful and see what kind of differentiator. And, and from there, it may or may not creep to other places, but we thought that'd be the best test, if you will. And in a relative scale, while we'll give it a good, honest run, it's not, you know, it's not a relative big deal.
You know, given the competitive landscape there, you know, how much investment are you putting behind that? Is this going to be a big, you know, like, a substantial amount, or are we scaling it for-
We're scaling it for-
Relative what?
We're scaling it for relative to what? Look, if we get 3% or 4% share, given that marketplace, we'll be happy.
I have, I mean, a great start. Sure.
And then look, the other side of this is obviously, and I know, I'd asked you about this directly and not all that long ago, but, but we actually had the pleasure of hosting, you know, Entain yesterday. My European colleague spoke with Rob Wood yesterday, and, you know, just kind of wanted your, you know, kind of your current thinking. It's been almost six months, probably since the last time, you know, we kind of directly, you know, hit on this. But, you know, how do you think about, you know, how Entain, you know, and MGM, you know, work together, you know, going forward?
You know, we continue to think through this idea of, you know, truthfully, this is probably about as balanced as a joint venture can be on the one side, but we also have to marry that with the idea that, you know, joint ventures don't... You know, at some point, one partner seems to kind of, kind of win out. So how do you balance that? And, and where—just where are we at with the Entain relationship?
So first and foremost, particularly as it relates to BetMGM, it's absolutely in their best interest and in our best interest to focus everything we can here. And in fairness to them, they've been doing a very good job of that, and you'll hear from Adam more about product and development, because we had gotten behind, and I think you're going to hear some things that are pretty exciting moving forward. And I give them credit, because they're basically the technology partner for really focusing and getting some important things accomplished. Look, I heard Rob's comment yesterday. We suffered the same fate. If you start taking the pieces and the parts of our share, we're trading at five times. So if you, if you get into it, I don't think either of us are getting value for what is inside BetMGM, which is not.
And so at some point, you know, time to tell, but I, I like the partnership. I like where we are. I like what it's been designed to accomplish, and it's starting to... It's done it. We got off to a great start. We've got some catching up to do. We're position number three in the market generally overall, and where we go from here, I think, you know, is somewhat unlimited, and so I'm excited by that.
Let's kind of move to, you know, just broader strategy. You know, it's kind of become a pastime to ask you about: what do you do with the cash, right? So $2 billion, I think, is the latest number that you put out there. So despite all this just incredible pipeline of investment, you know, you're still in a pretty, you know, cash-advantaged position. You're also—your business is obviously extraordinarily cash generative at the moment, too, so that doesn't hurt. So, walk us through, is there, you know, a remaining strategic pillar? Is there an M&A opportunity? Help us size what that could fit through, and/or do we—should we start earmarking this $2 billion for all the beautiful renderings that we just saw and start really thinking-
Yeah.
Where they're at?
So way to think about it is it's truly excess, even so much so that we've kept. It's actually $3.5 billion in cash. Our mindset is $1.5 billion sinking fund just for a rainy day, plus our credit facility, so think $3 billion. $2 billion excess cash. Japan, whether UAE, we're able to invest real money, time to tell. And ultimately, New York is all out of free cash. Cash flow is going forward because those investments don't start out until 2024, 2025, 2026. And so they will pay for themselves. They will be funded from that source. So the $2 billion is truly excess. How we think about it, you know, digital is the place we formed. I don't see a. Look, there may be some regional opportunities. I don't know of any immediately.
Las Vegas is pretty full right now. I think the FTC would have something to say if we wanted any more. And so, I think you can think about it as truly incremental. Think about digital in the, in the near-term sense and, and go from there.
So, so if we did think through the digital, you know, kind of idea, what capabilities would you be wanting to, you know, to kind of build onto? I mean, we think of LeoVegas being a little stronger in the iCasino or iGaming side. Is that, is there room to bolster in sports betting? Is it more market access, maybe more globally?
There's, if you're putting BetMGM and Entain aside, if you look at LeoVegas, it relies on Kambi, so the idea of its own sports betting technology is interesting. We would love to get in the live dealer business in, in the truest context. I mean, there's no reason that MGM Resorts, given its scale, its scope, its brand, and it, and everything about it, and it's a it, it shouldn't be at the forefront of anything to do with live, whether it's. Go back to my thing I said on my strategy, whether it's live dealer, whether it's the idea of celebrity meets live dealer, whether it's the idea of a game show that becomes monetized and, and streamed. You know, think about it, think about The Price is Right becomes a monetized game show. I mean, there's a lot can be done.
We need that technology piece to do that. And then ultimately with Push, which was kind of that third leg, to be able to create content principally around slots, jackpots, and other things that we own and we exclusively own, that we could put on our floor and ultimately then replicate digitally.
So not to get off track too far, but in terms of the relationship with between BetMGM or with Entain, could you do other digital things in the U.S., or is that sort of-
No, it's exclusive. It's exclusive to that.
Okay. So, like, LeoVegas has to stay?
Yes.
Yep.
Yeah.
Let's shift to some of the development stuff. So you gave us a couple of, I think, really important, really important, you know, increments. One, just the New York casino licensing process. So you do have the host agreement, you know, piece in place, which is a very or a community agreement, I believe is actually the, you know, the name in place. It's a hard one to get, but obviously, they already have some, you know, they already have an operating VLT facility. So timing, you know, this time next year was kind of what was what you said?
And it's a crystal ball, I hope. I can't imagine they would have started the process and then wanting to stop it again. So if that were to play itself out, with the exception of once we then get our RFAs in, which we have 30 days to submit, say, by year-end, then they're going to give a reasonable period of time to let other folks get their host city agreements in play. What's reasonable in this marketplace, given the environment of politics? You know, you all know better than I would, I suspect, but I would hope by this time next year. If - look, after 9 months, you can't get it in play-
Maybe you can, right? The other thing that comes up in New York occasionally is iGaming, actually, right? So, you know, OSB has been very successful here. It is at a pretty hefty tax rate, as we all know, but it's now, you know, generating a lot for the state. You know, is that really a prospect, or do you think... You know, I think we, we've generally heard it as land-based as the priority, maybe someday down the road, but don't hold your breath kind of thing. Like, how would you, how would you characterize that?
I would. Look, I would put it in that category, I suspect. You know, it depends on, frankly, the economy. Is there a need for tax revenues, et cetera? That always has a play in it. It, as it relates to the state of New York, it would be the last thing to go. I mean, basically everything else has been authorized. So, you know, states have taken a view, well, if we've done all of this, why not that? So I think there's signals and signs that would say, at some point, possibly, but I wouldn't count on it tomorrow either. I think it. They have said there was, you know, brick-and-mortar, and then we'll see. Obviously, we would love it.
I think Adam and the team could do a great job here, and obviously, given what we've done in Michigan and New Jersey, where we have dominant share because of brick-and-mortar, it does make a difference.
I don't think I've seen anything in the law or like, even beliefs by politicians that, like, all three have to get awarded at the same time. But is that... Is it your assumption that all three licenses to be awarded?
There isn't anything in the law-
Yeah.
Been unclear, at least. That's our understanding.
Yeah.
That's what the governor and ultimately, frankly, the chairman of the commission has said. They want us to do this collectively. We'll see. I will say this, though. It's something to think about. If they said go tomorrow, we could have table games in place in 4 months-6 months. Because everything you saw there, I'm not closing that place to do that. It'll be an ongoing business. And so, you know, the state will get its $500 million immediately, and we'll be in the table games business fairly quickly.
Switching over to Japan, obviously, one you've personally been invested in. I've, you know, had the unique pleasure of actually hosting you over there at one point. Funny story with Jim that I'll share after this, maybe. Sarah might know it. But you know, talked about September 29th, I think was the possible signing agreement, you know, if things hold, you know, hold to stand. But the thing that's most interesting to me is just kind of where we're at with... You know, once we're there, once that signing is done, is it construction crews and dirt moving, or again, you know, walk us through that next 12-24 months?
It's dirt moving. So this is a man-made island. Yumeshima, which is where this place is, it's about 20 minutes south of downtown Osaka. And the last stop currently on the train is Universal Park. Now, will be the last stop on the train. And it literally across the street from where they're going to put World Expo. It's a landfill. It was designed and developed to be the home of the 1972 Olympics, and they lost to Munich. And so we've got mitigation work. We've done some, but we've got significant as well as the city. The city is giving us about $800 million to help mitigate the ground, the dirt, and we have to begin pylons. So we think by next spring, we can begin pylons. It's a lot of piles.
We're going down to 70 meters for most of this project, and so we'll be drilling piles better part of 2024, early 2025, and then you'll begin to see hard construction going up from there forward.
Not to be a construction nerd, but is the depth partially for earthquake? Like, what's the-
The hit.
That's actually, we just need to hit bedrock.
The bedrock.
Okay. Wow!
Yeah.
Um.
We have one of those buildings, anyway.
So, you talked about some of the TAM opportunities there, but you also mentioned the budget. You know, $10 billion has sort of been that number that's been floating out there, but there's some press that hit earlier in the week. I'm not sure. I don't think it was officially from MGM necessarily, about that number moving higher, maybe by, you know, 10% or 15%. So is that real? You know, and more importantly, I think big picture, that number does seem like it dates back to some more of the proposal stage. So how are you offsetting that? Because there's been some... I mean, I think inflation is something we all know a little bit about.
Two, three things. We understand the basis of where we're coming from as a company, think CityCenter. I recognize we speak with solid voice on this. We have spent an extensive amount of time re-scoping the project. The original project versus the one you saw is about 20%-25% less GFA. That's how we got there. We refused to move the budget, and I refused to reduce the size of the casino, so it's complicated, but we got there. Why you see an escalation is it's in the end, particularly for our partner. Remember that the yen is trading at 145 or 147—I don't know, some, some silly number right now. It won't last forever. We've begun to hedge in already.
Mm-hmm.
and we'll continue to do that, so we can take advantage of it. And so we still see it as a $10 billion project. Our half, our 40%, $4 billion, our half 50, $2 billion. That's how we see it.
And, you know-
And look, it's a long way away, and anything, of course, can happen, but, but it's not like all of that hasn't to date, been put into the formula.
And from a dollars and cents perspective, is there anything big upfront that investors need to be aware of? Like, you know, is there $1 billion that needs to go to the government?
No.
Or is this going to be pretty pro rata?
Pro rata, but our money goes first. So you'll see our money late 2024, 2025, 2026, going out the door.
Okay.
The way it funds there, we go first. It's not fair pursuit.
Meaning you're ahead of your partner, or meaning-
No, we're ahead of the bank.
You ahead of bank. Okay.
Okay.
Equity before debt.
Right.
I got somebody who probably likes stuff like that.
Yeah.
So, and then, like, let's talk about the UAE. I mean, this is, this is interesting. It's just—it's all of a sudden become, I think, a lot more tangible. You know, big thing was the appointment of your predecessor, so you kind of glossed over it, but for those of you who didn't see the headlines, Jim Murren was appointed, I think, chairman of either a formative regulatory body or, you know-
Of the gaming commission.
Yeah, effectively, the gaming commission over there. So walk us through a couple of the critical paths of what kind of need to happen to see gaming in this part of the world. I mean, this could be a huge...
Well, reportedly, there's a gaming decree that has been signed but not released, but somewhere in between all of this activity, Case. I can assure you that Wynn's not in the ground without a clear understanding. But go back to what I said: Each emirate has the right to do this or not. And so and each emirate has the right to basically design, under the auspices of the commission, its own process. Obviously, what Wynn was anointed, and it was over. There may be a similar type process in Abu Dhabi, is the other place that actually has expressed interest, which I find interesting since it's the heart of the government. But the place that's of value, the place that has tourism today, that has the infrastructure, has 140,000 hotel rooms, has the massive airport, is Dubai.
And so we're already there, and so we're gonna, we're gonna let it happen around it, because the other three markets are not worth talking about anyways.
Sure.
We'll let it happen around us and hope and believe, particularly with the ruler as our partner, that we can push that project forward, up to and including gaming. I can't speak to the timing. I don't know. I can speak to the fact that they've issued a contract with China State that authorizes the building of this space.
What are your economics in a project like this? I mean, we've been through a few iterations with MGM on sort of non-gaming, you know, with, you know, the brand licensing pieces in China. At the end of the day, they probably didn't contribute as much as, as, you know, maybe even I would have thought back in the day. So, yeah, what are your, what's your stake in this, and then how do you turn this into real economics if you were to get it?
So the original stake was it was gonna be just a hotel management deal because we wanted the presence, for all the reasons we're talking about. We-- and so we had a little foresight, give us that credit. That being said, that's not the economics. So we have told them we'll put equity in, or we'll lease the casino in its totality and give us the casino business. I don't know that they're going to want to be in the casino business. I don't think that the ruler should-- well, can be. He can, should be anything he wants. It's his country. But the point is, I think at the end of the day, we're going to end up leasing the casino.
Sure.
What we're not going to do is take our brand, our company, our database, send it billion-dollar customers and get it, like an 8% or 10% vig. That ain't happening. So it's got to be a sizable piece of the real gaming business.
Interesting. And then maybe shifting gears to the, you know, to the fundamentals here and just kind of walking through the, you know, through the core. In Las Vegas, going through, you know, a ton, you've been investing a lot, you know, in that, you know, in that business as well. Help us think about, you know, one of the big themes of the whole event here has been, you know, leisure normalization. Vegas just isn't seeing it. So help us square this, I mean, because as far as we can see, and we've got some board intel, not as good as MGM's, but not terrible at this point. You know, and things look strong. I mean, the rate side, the rate structure looks strong.
You know, is there anything that, that concerns you, keeps you up at night? Do you see any change across, you know, customer segments or property types that, that-
Sure, why don't you kick it off, and then I'll-
Sure. You know, when you look at Las Vegas versus other leisure destinations, one of the benefits that we have as a city and as a company are all of the entertainment events that we have. So, you know, post 2020, we now have Allegiant that is, you know, fully programming. We've added about 10% of our mix to casino and lessened our reliance on the leisure customer. We have most of our convention business back, but we still have opportunity to bring further convention business back, both as the tech companies start coming back and also once we finish the construction that we have going on at Mandalay Bay.
Then, you know, we'll keep looking. Look, it's fascinating. We see luxury, we see drive, we see what I mentioned about the average rates earlier. We're not, not paying attention to the general macro economy. And I would remind all of us that during the Great Recession, we still ran 82%, so it's about RevPAR. And so even though they, they have agreed to pay rates going forward for this programming, what they bring with them, time will tell. But I got to tell you, you know, as it relates to other noise and issues, we are in really good shape.
We-
Yeah.
It was in July, like, not exactly boom times for Vegas. It was the highest gaming revenue month ever.
Yeah.
There were some hold, positive hold that played in there, but how much... I mean, you mentioned 10%, 10 percentage points higher casino mix. How much of this is being driven by players spending to a higher level versus just having more players there?
Well, for us, it's having more players there because we're running, we ran 94%. I think just July, we ran 95%.
Yeah.
It's not about a lot. It's not about more people.
Yeah.
It's about more players spending. Well, the high end did really well, but it's about more players spending more, and it's that mix shift. And so for us, it's, it's everything from taking advantage of the BetMGM database, the regional database, going deeper into our, frankly, getting more sophisticated on our own end with our digitization and how we approach customers and how we think about them.
Yeah.
I think we've done a better job going forward, and we'll continue to improve upon that. But it's paying, you know, 30%. Those thirty percent are still holding it at 35% spend, market spend to get them there. And so it's not like we're over-incentivizing. You'd see it in our margins if we were.
It's not that each individual or certain individuals are spending more, it's that there are more higher-spending individuals in the market.
Yes. Yes. And look, we've traded Mirage for Cosmopolitan. I mean, there's, you know, there's some uptick.
Maybe one quick one, two quick ones to wrap up. Regionals, you know, I'm kind of curious here on more of the network strategy piece for you, Bill. Like, you've basically got flagships, I mean, pretty much the dominant asset in the regional markets, I think virtually all that you operate in. You know, is there a desire at all to expand? I mean, if, you know, there's—we hear about Richmond, we hear about Chicago, possibly North Carolina. Like, you know, are there places where you're kind of comfortable with the portfolio today? How do you see it as a database engine piece to kind of feeding, you know, a bigger and bigger Vegas?
It's an important database engine. Now, we don't use it the way Penn potentially could leverage it or the way Caesars leverages it, to be sure, but we don't ignore it. And so it provides 7%-9% of our casino base comes out of database that originates from, from regional casinos. That being said, you're right. I mean, unless it's a unique one. The example is Borgata. Borgata, when the market was $5.9 billion, made $200 million. It's $2.7 billion, it still makes $200 million. So the, we have proven to ourselves to go in, have the market, you know. And so if those places don't exist today, and there's not. I can't think of one off the top, maybe one or two, but not many.
We do think about places like Texas as a long-term possibility, more than North Carolina. I mean, North Carolina is, Richmond's 120 miles from National Harbor, so that's not a thing. Georgia someday, but it's going to be at that scale.
Okay. Okay. Last question. I have 18 seconds. Can you get me tickets to Formula One?
I can. They're gonna cost, but I can. All right.
Thank you very much. Really appreciate it.
Thanks.
Sarah.
Yeah,
over here. Save $1,000. Back, everybody. Sorry for the slightly longer than anticipated break, but we want to make sure we stayed on time for the webcast. So, you know, pleasure to kick off our next presentation. It'll be with the management team from BetMGM. So, to my left is Chief Executive Officer Adam Greenblatt, and to his left is Gary Deutsch, Chief Financial Officer. So Adam, Gary, pleasure to welcome you. It's the first time I've been able to do this here with you.
Thank you for having us.
Thanks.
Great to be here.
So, huge privilege. We don't get to do too much public-facing stuff, and you get the luxury of technically being private and on your own. I think Gary's like, maybe wishing he had that luxury right, right now.
Quasi is the word I use. Quasi.
Um-
I actually think the opposite, by the way. I think we have two public shareholders to-
Uh-
... sets of public shareholders to, to support. But anyway.
It's true. Two masters.
Exactly.
So, let's just start at a high level, Adam. Maybe what we've been kind of starting with in the digital landscape is just give us the lay of the land. I mean, tonight is NFL kickoff, which is pretty exciting for the Americans, I'm going to guess, with the accent. You know, maybe we needed the Premier League a couple weeks ago. But let's just, yeah, kind of state of the market. How do you kind of frame up growth, and how have things progressed to where we sit today?
Yeah.
And then we'll take it from there.
Perfect. That's a great intro. So I'm more excited now than I can remember being in my role at BetMGM, without reservation. And the reason I say that, in fact, it harkens back to the moment where I read one of the industry analysts tweeted that said, "Where there were two before, now there are three." And I feel like the commencement of the football season today marks how we feel internally the relaunch of BetMGM. Why? You'll see, one of the beautiful things about our business, our sector, is that as a consumer, you can see, you can test the things that we're telling you. You can download the BetMGM app, try to deposit, try to navigate our sports app, our sports book, and you will feel the work that we've been doing over the last nine months.
We've acquired Angstrom, and in fact, I want to talk about that later. I'm sure we will.
Yeah.
We've, Entain has acquired Angstrom, which will have a massive impact on our sports pricing, our single game offering, our in-play offering. We've done a deal with... In fact, today, we've announced the, on the gaming side of our business, we announced the launch of the Buffalo games, slot games. This is a global first for online for, I think, without reservation, one of the most popular games in, in retail slots play. As you think about BetMGM and one of our core, the core pillars of, of, of who we are and how we differentiate ourselves is omni-channel. This represents the perfect intersection between what gamers were doing, have been doing for 15 years and what we are inviting them to do with us in the future.
And so as I look back again at the 2021, when BetMGM took the lead in iGaming from another licensee in New Jersey, and we then asserted ourselves, asserted ourselves. Now we're the number three in aggregate position with 17% market share, as we asserted ourselves from, frankly, nothing. That, I have the same feeling now. I have the feeling of possibility. I feel like I have a sense that the work that, as I say, we've done in product, speed and, speed and stability, improved navigation, a whole new front-end design system, making things more intuitive, a deeper content offering, more live markets, signature bets, which only are available at BetMGM because of Angstrom, which we must come back to.
All of this gives me great excitement for meeting and exceeding the guidance we've given to the market. You know, we've already said the bottom end is $1.8 billion-$2 billion. We, in the first half, did more than half of that from a revenue perspective. We were profitable in the second quarter. The wind is in our sails, so feeling really good about that. Thank you.
No, it's a really exciting opening. So let's build off that a little bit. You know, just to frame where BetMGM is actually at, it was something that stuck out to me, and I just wanted to get an update on was, I think in our first conversation, I mean, you got to remember that there's big companies involved here, but you were effectively employee number one, I think, of BetMGM. That was the way you framed it to me. But what blew my mind was then it was either a year, or maybe it was the second year anniversary, you know, you were up to 500 people already. So what's the number today? Can you give us the quick, like, annual, 1 to a couple hundred to 500. Where are we today?
How big is the organization?
Let me just give you... Our business plan, when we formed the joint venture, had us capping out at about 220 employees. We're now 2,500 worldwide.... So, you know, it's a very different business today.
Fascinating. And so, you know, there's a few different ways we could go. I think one of the big. I kind of want to start with some market, you know, kind of viewpoints and structures.
Yes.
One thing that's really been our biggest surprise as we kind of look back on how the market has evolved, so one way is obviously just size and scope and scale. But another way is, you know, this kind of fascinating increase in change in behavior that's led to parlays and hold rates. You know, I'm fascinated to kind of dig into your view on that. A, has it surprised you? And B, you know, how has this played out versus your experience in Europe? Because you bring unique lens. You actually already know what, you know, had happened in a developing market. You were there for it. So, yeah, this just feels different. So how does it feel for you?
It does feel different, actually. If you look at some of the world markets, the more developed digital markets, and certainly the more mature sports markets, there are very few that are trending the way the U.S. is trending. And so I put my hand up, make way for the truth always, is, is what I say. You know, we've—I, I didn't anticipate it, but as you look at the U.S. market, it makes sense why. And there are two principal reasons for it. So one, you have a very developed lottery sector, and of course, with the multi-leg, single-game parlays, it's low stake, high upside, high win. So it's a very—it's akin to a lottery product. The difference, however, is that as the bettor you have a perspective on every leg, you think you know, right?
So it's not like just choosing a bunch of numbers and, you know, the lottery comes out with what it comes out. You think you have an edge because you have an opinion, and that's one of the attractions of... That's the, the parlay, if you'd excuse the pun, from a lottery player to a multi-product sports player. That's the one element of it. The other element, and I, and I tip my hat to season-long fantasy. U.S. sports players have had 20 years of engaging with an event from a multi-event perspective, a multi-thing perspective. You know, it's, triple doubles or number of rebounds or, you know, individual player performances, and the interaction of those things has been part of the training, right?
Right.
And so what we're seeing today is just the transport of that training into a new product. So it's an extension of an ingrained way of looking at a sports event.
With some of your international knowledge, give us a sense of some of the penetration rates we see. Are these? Is it just that the speed of the market in the U.S. has kind of maybe caught up faster than to where the penetration of, you know, a parlay, which I believe in the U.K. is an accumulator?
Yes, exactly.
Yeah, right. You know, is it just the speed with which that's occurred, or are we kind of in new territory here? Or is this like, no, this is a different customer, you know, and again, a different behavior? The way you laid it out, again, I like that lottery with edge. You know, it sounds like it's a slightly different behavior, which again, from an American cultural standpoint, yeah, there's always going to be differences.
I think the margin potential in the U.S. exceeds most other markets because of this behavior. I think the recreational nature of multi-leg parlay products bodes well for the industry as we penetrate more deeply into the population.
Right.
So I'm very bullish on margin potential.
Just to be clear, when you say margin, you're talking bet margin or win margin?
Yes, great. Gross win margin.
Yeah, great. So let's talk about market share, and then this is going to get into some of the, you know, the things you're working on, going into this fall and prospectively. But, you know, as we sort of track the industry data, and I don't think what I'm going to say is, you know, that controversial. You know, on the OSB side, MGM, BetMGM's share has slipped, you know, modestly from where it was. So walk us through that. You know, what do you think was there? One thing that we look at is, you know, Gary, if you have, you know, color on this, too, you were probably one of the first to be, I think, pretty promotionally disciplined, and it took time for the market to kind of catch back up on that. So maybe that's one factor.
Secondarily to that, yeah, what's going on on sort of the product or evolution side that might be doing this, and what are we doing to fix it?
Yep. There are three things playing into the answer. One, you've heard from Bill in some of the MGM commentary previously, the sports product wasn't where we collectively wanted it to be for the U.S. market. So let me just deal with the three, and then I'll jump into the detail on each of them. One is product, two is promotional intensity, three is share of voice. So raw dollars spent above the line, communicating about the brand, driving acquisition and retention. Okay? This year for BetMGM... So we've always been disciplined, always been disciplined about managing our, the ROI and our cohorts. That's just the way we are.
Managing our investment in above-the-line spend, we've had a very strong bias from the beginning to be short-term, flexible, and move to where the money is, move to where the player values are. So high conversion rate, high player value, low CPA. That's the Holy Grail. That's our business, right? And the way to achieve that, and you heard from one of our competitors earlier about their response to the ESPN deal. Why are they happy that the ESPN deal has happened? Because they got out of a high-ticket, fixed-cost commitment that wasn't performing. That's not a place where we want to be.... Yeah, so structurally, we avoid that.
Mm-hmm.
So we've always been disciplined, but the push for profitability this year, we needed to tighten the screws, and we have done.
Mm-hmm.
So that's healthy, though. That's a, that's a healthy change. The second, in terms of, product, frankly, we've been working damn hard on improving our product, frankly, our sports product, in every dimension. I've rattled through some of the, some of those dimensions. How it feel—how fast it feels in your hand.
Right.
What's on the shelf? So market availability.
Mm-hmm.
So event availability, how broad is my offering? There are hundreds of plus games or college games on a Saturday. Do you cover all of them? Do you cover just the top 20, which is where you make the most money, right? These are choices that the business has had to make and support operationally-
Mm-hmm.
That has now been enhanced through the work we've been doing, principally with Entain. So more events, wider. More markets, deeper. And then within that, those markets, what have you got that's special, right? Differentiated things. And then on top of that, what can you do with all of those things on the shelf, i.e., combinability? And availability is the last one. So there's something in our business called suspension times. I don't know if any of the bettors that are here, you'll know that at certain moments in an event, there's not a price available, right? Why is there no price available? Because the risk management foundation supporting price development of a price doesn't have an answer, right? If Kelce gets injured after the first quarter, is the total points expected for the game the same or not?
So until it's known whether he can continue to play or not, the price is uncertain. Suspension, right? If he is off, what is the repricing? Like, where does the price go? It depends on how many minutes have elapsed, how many minutes are to go, how is the game performing, what is the momentum, right? These are all factors. We have not been as good as we now will be with Angstrom in the past. So availability is the last element of that. So these are all aspects of the sports product that we've been working on, that as I said, invite all of you down, if you don't have it already, download the BetMGM app and see for yourself. We are more than a year ahead of where we were just at the Super Bowl this year.
If you can do it in New Jersey versus in New York, that's better.
You get more value.
If you don't get that, if you don't get that joke, I'll explain to you after. So, two kind of places I want to go deeper. One is, you know, one thing we know you've been working really hard at, and I believe you made a ton of progress on, is, you know, single app, single wallet. So where are we at with kind of shared wallet across states, all the cross, you know, state functionality? Because that was a rollout that still needed to occur, and I think you're either close or there. So that, and then let's unpack what exactly the feature set that Angstrom really allows you to do a little bit more deeply, but maybe start with just where the shared wallet.
Sure. Sure, sure. So, we have completed single account, single wallet migration across all of our digital states in the US, bar Nevada, for regulatory reasons. So I can't emphasize the scale of that project. We have, through this project, moved billions of individual data fields, tens of millions of individual records, applying migration logic to every potential use case. Player started here, ended there. Player has two accounts, one is dormant. Player has RG, RG limits in that state, but not there. It is... You know, I heard Eric talking this morning about their single account, single wallet project that's ahead of them. It's anything but trivial, and so we're delighted to have got to the other side of that, and Tony has been brilliant on this.
We've had hundreds of people supporting this initiative, and to my relief and delight, we haven't missed a beat. You know, our business has been rock solid through the summer as we've undertaken these four phases of migration, and which is why, you know, with kickoff tonight of the NFL season, we're pretty... I think we're really well-placed. The second part of your question was?
Uh, Angstrom.
Angstrom.
Can we just talk a little bit?
Yes.
You know, this is one that I think maybe it's the across the pond, you know, you kind of glance over when you see the announcement, but I've now had time with Entain yesterday, time with Bill earlier today, you know, and I think it, it really was Rob Wood that, you know, I think helped us understand, like, no, this is a pretty big deal. So help us kind of get our arms around what capabilities this provides you that you didn't have before.
So let me tell you why this is a big deal. So first, what's in a name? So who knows what an Angstrom is? Angstrom is a unit of measurement, which is 10 to the power -10, which is one hundred millionth of a centimeter. Why is this relevant, Adam? This is just all nerd stuff. It's relevant because this is the philosophical underpinning of the way Angstrom builds its models. So they seek to build their models from the most smallest unit, the smallest basis up. And as you know, you build your own models. If you build from the bottom up, every step of the build, the relationships between these, between the things are understood.
And if you apply it to our world, that means the relationships between certain events, certain things happening in an, in a game, are understood, understood by the model, and therefore priceable by the model. And not only priceable, they're also combinable. So as you look to the future, and our future is infinite combinability, to have, from a bottom-up basis, every play of every game simulated through a Markov Chain, built player-level, bottom up, all integrated into our and Entain's trading platform. The ability for us to create unique, special, differentiated, player, exciting, single game parlays. Race two, is the quarterback going to be on fire tonight? So are they going to complete their first five passes? We can do that. And this is why Angstrom's exciting.
So it's not only product, the range of product offering, we're also targeting sub-500 milliseconds of price availability, which means back to the point about availability, price is available quickly. Event happens, model does its thing, price back in front of players, which means more bets, more often, better player experience.
Does this effectively allow you, and this is probably a small subset, because, again, there's a technology reliability piece-
Yes.
and control piece that is not included in what I'm asking. But what I'm asking is, like, just the sort of basic, you know, building blocks of in-game betting, you know, creating... And I think we all are—more and more, we know about sort of the outsource provider here, Simplebet, you know, offering sort of micro betting markets. Does this allow you to sort of do this in-house and then, you know, like you said, customize it? Is it not only a replacement, but then beyond that, or, you know, or is that independent? They're going to do markets, you're going to do markets. Help us kind of just-
Yeah.
contextualize it versus a product like that.
Of course. As I said, the way the models are built, and every price that a player sees is built based on simulating every single permutation of play for the rest of the game. Of course, all of the history that supports some of the underpinning assumptions. Outcome of next play is built into the model. All of the drive markets will be, like any of our other markets, available in our platform. That's to your live project, to our live product. We don't think we will need anybody else from a sports pricing and product generation perspective.
That's clear. And then, this is an acquisition, so are we closed, and when do we get it if, you know, we don't have it now?
So we've already integrated some of their markets that will be available tonight for the NFL. This infinite combinability and all of their outputs, the deep integration of the Angstrom platform into our own Entain trading platform, that comes end of the quarter, end of Q4, so during pre-Super Bowl.
Just to be clear, and I thought this was really interesting, but I think if I can summarize what Rob told us, and please correct me if I get anything wrong, but I think what we heard yesterday from Entain was, yes, Angstrom was acquired by Entain, technically, but all of the rollout effort is targeted at BetMGM, and it's for, like, the next 12 or 18 months, the foreseeable future. Down the line, they're looking forward to being able to roll out to actually Entain's business. Again, I found that fascinating in twofold. One, you know, just the kind of, "Hey, wait, they acquired this, but for you," and then secondarily, showing the priority that they're giving, you know, your business and what they're and they're putting their own dollars behind that, you know, and that's on their P&L.
Look, I would obviously care and love BetMGM, care about, you know, and so I would look at that comment and say, this is, for me, this is rational capital allocation, and I applaud Rob for that response. I think that, you know, that Entain is acting in shareholders' best interest by doing so. This is the biggest game in town by far. You know, there was talk of the maturity, the, the size of the UK market earlier. It's also mature, right? We have billions of dollars of capital value opportunity ahead of us, and Angstrom is one of the key elements of that. It's a key unlock to gaining meaningful ground, and then that's certainly our ambition, gaining meaningful ground on the incumbent leaders in sports.
So let's switch gears a little bit. I want to talk about competition and maybe sort of wrap, you know, promotion in this a little bit too. But obviously, sort of the, you know, there's been lots of news in the space, but the big news over the last few weeks was, you know, Penn's agreement with ESPN. And so, you know, I think I want to put this in the broader context. We also have, you know, Fanatics out there with PointsBet. You know, we hear, and certainly from the UK side, I think there's always an ear up around bet365 is making waves in Ohio.
... you know, what do they want? What, what's their next move? So all that translates into competition. So how do you think about it from two perspectives? One, just, you know, big picture, how do you think the fall plays out? And are we taking a step back on sort of the broader sort of profitability implications? And then competitively, how do you react? Do you, you know, defend territory and have to throw more dollars to hold serve? Do you competitively let people, you know, see experiment and see what works, and then come back to you? Like, what, what's the strategy?
I think players will always experiment. You know, my expectation is, what, ESPN BET will launch, and they'll get a ton of samplers, but the player—the product experience is the same as it is today, you know, and the impact of that player experience is visible, right? I'm happy to compete against that. The reality is there have been a series of departees, and obviously, you've already made... I, you know, called out the new entrants. And frankly, the rotation has been towards more formidable groups.
Right.
Having said that, our sector is hard and shouldn't be underestimated. And to, to gain meaningful ground against the incumbents, I think, will be extremely challenging. I have great respect for all of those organizations, you know, bet365 and ESPN. Great respect for them. But we are doing the business, and they are not. And until you are, you don't really have a... You know, we can speculate as, as, as much as we want. I think to make meaningful ground, refining every day, doing their best every day. To come at this from a standing start, you need to both be, have differentiated assets that are better than those who are part of risk, compliance, right? That doesn't let your players down.
Right.
We've been refining all of those dimensions every day. Sorry, Gary.
Well, as you alluded to earlier, we've been really flexible in how we can handle our budgeting and our marketing. We can pivot very quickly. Lots of stuff in the digital, obviously, others, we believe, and we can direct the spend as needed on a competitive basis as we read the market, too.
Thank you for getting me back on track. The bottom line is we are going to play out. We've, in fact, today, we'll be airing in the second quarter Jamie Foxx's return after his health scare. So there's been a lot already, a lot, and you're going to see us much more forcefully over the coming weeks and months.
Help us put that in perspective, both, you know, sort of theoretically and kind of tack terms. Again, one of the spend per player, you know, dollar spend per player to acquire customers. A year ago, I think a big part of what's allowed for a rebound in valuations in the space. Do you think that, you know, that goes up? And, more importantly, are you budgeted for that? I mean, is that okay? Is that underwritten?
Gary will kill me if I say we're gonna, we're gonna chase that train.
Has to be considered. So the rewards to which we would grant to new players to work with us, to be with us, is not that different than it's ever been. It's just where they're on that outer layer of being new, and thus in that period of high bonusing, is fewer as a percentage of the business. So that brings down the overall metric on a blended basis. Now, when we talk about bonus op, we've been looking at sort of the long tail and seeing where, you know, we've segmented players whose high value, whose mid value, et cetera. And it's been on that work and understanding, you know, who isn't really developing from the setting phase. But when it comes to how we treat our best players and how we treat the new players, it's very similar to what we've done in building the business.
But really, I think to add to that, your strange market with distortions as a result of the new players phase ahead of us, I think that irrational. If there are periods of distortion, is just too much value being thrown at players, if we are into that, I think the smartness of this organization of this group, both from the analyst community and the investor community, I don't think will suffer, but won't suffer fools anymore.
Thank you for sort of tackling that head-on.
Yeah.
You know, Gary, I want to go a little deeper, kind of back in, I think it's January, February, when you guys made some, you know, prepared remarks. There's a lot of talk about bonus optimization being a big piece of, you know, 2023. So your journey there, and I think you were kind of getting into that in terms of, you know, cohorts, layers. You know, one piece of math we've done, you know, relatively recently is this is kind of the year where, you know, if you-- the majority of customers should be shifting into 24- and 36-month lifetimes, which means, you know, your paybacks should be there on actually more than 50%. Directionally, so what are the implications of both? Sort of your internal strategy and, and kind of what does that entail?
And then secondarily, am I kind of right in terms of my waterfall?
So the guidance that we've given all along. So it's been progressing. So when we think about how the model, I say that the model is the metric, and when we look at the long-term path towards the 30%+ EBITDA margins, it has a journey of NGR margin and a journey within that of how promotions go. And all along the way, we've been hitting those, those metrics. So when we think about bonus optimization, it was a lot of what I was saying, and we said: You know, are there players that maybe we could get rid of sooner or not incent any longer because we can kind of get a read on them? But everything related to the evolution towards the guidance we've given on payback on new sports states, that's generally there.
Sports has, I mean, gaming has been faster than the 18 months we've guided. So that's coming along. We see some states like Massachusetts and Ohio, that the negative period of investment has been shortened and we, you know, we're at the pace period of seeing if now that's going to be shortened to the long-term profitability and
That seems to be moving directionally correct. But, look, one thing on bonusing, and bonusing optimization has been important to this, but, but bonusing is a key part of the business, and it's something we've used to great advantage, given where our start, starting point was with customers. And I like to just put it in perspective. So if you have two operators, they each deliver NGR of $1,000 in a month. One had $2,000 GGR, and another had $1,200 GGR that fell to $1,000 of, of NGR. Which one is better? Because one could argue that the one who did $2,000 down to $1,000, oh, they burned money, and they could have done more.
Or you could easily argue that the one who only had 1,200 going to 1,000 didn't invest enough in the players, and they could have invested more. So the good thing about promo to pay themselves back. Now, there's tax implications and stuff, as you know, but overall, bonusing is a stimulus as much as it is a... It's a cost, but it's stimulating if it's done right. So don't read high bonusing necessarily as a bad thing.
To add to that, we are seeing, so they are evolving in the way that we had anticipated, you know, early dig, then through break even, then into contribution positive, and they layer on each other.
So carry this through to its nth degree for me, Gary, for a second, because, you know, one thing, it, I, I really framed a lot of my thinking over the last, you know, kind of relatively simple roadmap you laid out for, you know, sort of why your overall margin structure, and now I'm talking EBITDA margins, not bet margin and not sort of the GGR, NGR relationship, but let's just say, your overall profit, you know, margin at a company, would be better. All other things equal, it was market access through MGM, it was technology, you know, subsidization through Entain and now Angstrom, obviously, and then-
Casino game royalties, leverage on payment processing relationships, marketing through easier access to customers.
So has anything changed in either, you know, your spread to kind of where you think the market is, or more importantly, the overarching market assumption, be it mix of OSB or iGaming, how do you think about sort of profitability of this business long term?
It's the same guidance. I mean, we're, we're in that area. We think that those, the guidance on the percentage point advantage we had, I think that's still accurate. This is not to say things aren't fluid in the industry, and there's industry things related to taxes and different things that can change the dynamics for the whole industry. We think, pari passu to our competitors, we still have those same advantages.
I get this one, so I'm going to put you on the spot a little bit, but Ohio did change the tax rate. Historically, in gaming in the U.S., this is pretty rare, actually, right? So Illinois messed around with tax rates in casino gaming, but obviously, you know, it has been a lot more volatile of an environment, more from unregulated to regulate or reregulate in Europe. What do you make of the Ohio development? Is there nervousness that this is going to carry on to lots of other states?
They don't generally let me talk about taxes, they get too irritated. So sometimes, maybe that's a question for Adam.
We're not seeing any evidence of contagion. Sure, it was an unwelcome change, and we feel actually an unproductive change for the health and vibrancy of the regulated versus unregulated markets. But we're not seeing any evidence of contagion.
Great. All right, one minute left, so quick lightning round. You know, I put you on the spot a little bit. Of the new entrants out there, Fanatics, ESPN BET, and bet365, who keeps you up at night, and why?
None of those keep me up at night. Those that I'm paying closer attention to are the incumbent leaders. bet365 is a formidable entity, and that just is what it is.
One year from today, will market share be more consolidated among the top three or less? And why, if you can.
Probably similar, but the market share outside of the top three, which includes us, will be differently configured.
So it's always awkward on the sort of the JV question, and I kind of got chances with your partner, so I'm not going to really go there. But I do care as a business leader, does the JV structure, you know, create really any limitation or hindrance to what you're executing on every day? Do you have the investment that you need? How does it kind of impact your role?
I mean, we have recent evidence of the investment being there through the acquisition of Angstrom. You heard Bill talking about the relationship with Marriott, which we've also not piggybacked, but partnered with them on. We're getting tremendous support. I mean, the focus and priority on BetMGM by our shareholders has never been higher. And so, you know, for that, I'm grateful, and so is, you know... The impact on BetMGM is visible.
Just sort of as a student of the industry, three years ago, we were all wondering what was going to surprise on the growth side. It turned out, you know, kind of parlays and the bet margin or the, you know, the hold rate just being so much bigger. From here, what's the big thing that investors or people in this room are missing? What's that thing that's gonna... What could be the next thing?
I think we've got the things today have a ways to run. I don't think we have anything like the same game parlay impact ahead of us. I think we'll see more creativity and innovation, actually, I think, on the iGaming side. We'll see some free-to-play and engagement tools on the sports side, and then innovation around game mechanics, game play on the gaming side.
Adam, Gary, that's all we have time for. It's a real pleasure. Thank you for doing this.
Thank you.
Thanks, Shaun.
Thank you.