In Las Vegas the Wynn Resorts dominate the skyline and coupled with Steve Wynn’s personality – he was consider Mr. Las Vegas. Then the me too movement happened and it was seen Mr. Wynn besides being a wonderful casino and hotel operator could not pass a young woman working for him without trying to have some sort of sexual relations with him. Mr. Wynn was a big funder for political parties which dropped him and he left the role of Chair and President of Wynn Resorts. The final installment was to sell his shares the buyers were T. Rowe Price and Capital Research and Management two long term shareholders bought 8 million shares between them. The surprise was Galaxy Entertainment Group bought 4.9% of Wynn Resorts.

Galaxy is controlled by Hong Kong billionaire Lui Che-Woo in an article by Christopher Palmeri, Daniela Wei and Lisa Du of Bloomberg News noted Galaxy is the largest casino operator in Macau and this transaction could affect global gambling. It also positions Galaxy in a manner to takeover Wynn down the road, if desired. Macau which is the world’s largest gambling hub is expected to unveil in the coming months how it will review and give out casinos licenses. Galaxy is building a $500 million resort in the Philippines and wants to build in Japan as the company has legalized gambling.

If Galaxy was to go for control of Wynn it would cost in the range of $8.7 billion.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, sometimes everything is good and then it changes. In the case of Wynn, Mr. Wynn was respected, often talked about his managment style including respect for all his employees (you can see some of his talks on You Tube) and was considered the go to person in Las Vegas and elsewhere. Then the sexual allegations charges happened and existing management had to deal with succession plans quickly in order to ensure the company was not running on one spot. There is no doubt Mr. Wynn will be missed, however the company has moved on and can continue to operate and have its licences renewed.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.