The incident took place on July 2nd, last year, while McKee was playing the Miss Kitty slot machine at The Isle Casino in Waterloo, Iowa. Suddenly, the slot burst into a cacophony of ringing bells and flashing lights, with casino staff then rushing over to congratulate the lucky winner.

However, soon after McKee’s bubble was well and truly burst, especially after it was noted that the penny slot machine with a top payout of $10,000 was indicating she had won a staggering $41,797,550. The Isle Casino subsequently informed her of the computer error and that no money would be forthcoming.

Apparently, the errors are very rare and the Iowa Racing and Gaming Commission investigate only one or two slot malfunctions each year across the whole of the state. Other US casino past winners, who then cruelly saw their winnings disappear, include Bill Seebeck and his $166 million “win” at the Seminole Hard Rock Casino in Tampa, Florida, in 2009 and a Colorado woman, who “won” $42.9 million in 2010 at the Fortune Valley Casino in Central City.

In the latest incident, The Isle Casino had the Miss Kitty slot machine analyzed by Gaming Laboratories International in August, with the company then concluding that a communication board error was “highly likely” the cause of the machine’s false bonus award.

Nevertheless, McKee isn’t ready to back down yet and last week her attorney Steve Enochian filed a suit claiming breach of contract and consumer fraud. Mr Enochian is also arguing that the casino didn’t act upon the programming updates available for the slot, and that its employees failed to disable the slots’s award bonus capability.

The results were ahead of many analysts’ predictions of between 23 to 26 billion patacas for the month, mostly boosted by the Chinese Lunar New Year falling in January instead of February this year.

However, analysts are still unlikely to revise upwards their forecast for the year based on the result of just one month. In 2012, the prediction is for a 11% to 20% increase in growth, compared to the 42% experienced in 2011, and as  Deutsche Bank gaming analyst Carlo Santarelli explains:

“Given the shift of Chinese New Year into January, we believe February will pose a difficult comparison for the market, despite the extra day. As such, we believe looking at the aggregate of January and February for comparison purposes is more appropriate.”

This all points to February being an interesting month for Macau, with analyst Cameron McKnight from Wells Fargo & Co predicting a fall in revenue of 14% for the month. If that were to be the case, it would mark the first year-on-year fall in over two and a half years, when in June 2009 Macau suffered fall out from the global financial crisis.

Nevertheless, shares in the sector were moderately positive at a time when the benchmark Hang Seng Index was down by 0.3%. Overall, Sands China up 0.8% to HK$26.45, SJM Holdings Ltd up 2% to HK$14.16, MGM China Holdings Ltd up 0.9%, Galaxy Entertainment Group Ltd up 1.8%, Wynn Macau Ltd up 0.2% and Melco Crown Entertainment Ltd up 1.4%.

The last quarter of 2011 saw heavy selling of shares due to investor concerns of a sharp slowdown in the Chinese economy, but Macau shares have now gained between 4% and 21% since the beginning of 2012.

At 3:45a.m. on Thursday, January 19th, one lucky player at the Caesars poker room hit quad fours at odds of around 407 to 1. Expecting to win the hand, he soon discovered that his opponent with odds at 3,243 to 1, had cracked his hand holding quad eights to scoop the pot.

Nevertheless, any initial disappointment he may have instinctively felt soon turned to joy after realising he had hit the casino’s Bad Beat Jackpot which stood at $307,482. Consequently, he was awarded $93,313 for the indignity of losing with quads, while his opponent also received $62,565 for the winning hand. In addition, 25 patrons playing at Caesars poker room at the time each collected $1,068 just for being there.

However, the consequences of the hand didn’t finish there, though, and the pooled jackpot was further shared between 117 other players at Harrah’s Resort, Bally’s and Showboat, each of whom also collected a payout of $1,068 apiece.

Commenting on the milestone hand, Caesars Entertainment Eastern Division President Don Marrandino, said:  

“The Bad Beat Poker Jackpot hitting for the twentieth time is truly a milestone in our storied poker history. As the East Coast home of the WSOP and first to debut a accumulative Bad Beat Jackpot, I can honestly say poker is something we here at Caesars Entertainment Atlantic City take very seriously. We’re extremely proud to have given out more than $5 million over the last 16 months to our dedicated poker players.”

On average, the Bad Beat Jackpot has now been hit every one and a half months and following the latest win, the jackpot was reset to $100,000 with quad queens set as the qualifying hand.

The two attendants wearing nothing but their panties can clearly be seen standing by a dice gaming table, with Thai money and a Thai game rules board clearly visible in the photo.

Responding to the incident, acting MPB deputy chief Pisit Pisutsak, said that if the photos prove to be genuine then it would indicate a significant escalation by criminals of illegal gambling establishments in Thailand.

At present, police are examining the photos in order to try identifying any of the people featured, with Police Lt Gen Winai commenting that if found to be in Bangkok, then the supervising police officer in that area would also face punishment.

In the past, many illegal Thai casinos have allegedly been linked to corrupt military and police officers, who then offer protection in order for payoffs. Therefore, previous high-profile raids often have only short-term effects.

Only last August, outspoken politician Chuvit Kamolvisit claimed senior police officers owned illegal casinos in central Bangkok, leading to several high-ranking police officers being investigated.

Furthermore, the now Deputy Prime Minister Chalerm Yubumrung said that while his party was in opposition, he had been carrying out research into Bankok’s casinos:  

“I am the insider, I know how to pay. I know how to bribe. You see bribery in Thailand is a deeper issue, problem than anyone can think…but no one wants to say the truth,” commented Chalerm Yubumrung.

In general, casinos are illegal in Thailand but a study concluded last year that around 170 casinos of varying size continued to operate in Bangkok alone. Allegedly, the casino proprietors then pay between 5% and 20% of their illegal gains as bribes.

Apparently, back in May, 2008, Canadian Len Barrie negotiated credit worth US$1.5 million with the Bellagio at a rate of 18% interest per year, and backed up by 11 “negotiable credit instruments.”

Despite repaying $420,000 of the amount to reduce his outstanding debt to $1.08 million, Barrie’s credit instruments were then later returned “dishonoured” leading to the Bellagio taking court action in March 2011 to retrieve the remaining $1.08 million.

Subsequently, Clark County District Court in September 2011 awarded the Bellagio the full debt of $1.08 million plus $640,000 in interest and a further $420,000 in attorney fees and court costs, to take Barrie outstanding debt to $2,221,166.

The Bellagio’s notice of claim has now been filed in the Supreme Court of British Columbia, but Len Barrie is disputing the amount sought by the casino. Commenting on the suit, Barrie said:

“We have a little dispute and we will have to see how this finishes. We don’t agree with the amount. We’ve already paid $400,000, [and] we think the amount should be smaller. And when we settle on the amount, we’ll get it paid and will move on.”

As well as the Bellagio Casino’s lawsuit, Len Barrie is also facing a number of other suits related to his Bear Mountain development project in Langford, British Columbia, Canada.

Len Barrie claims he only earned up to $525,000 during each NHL season and was worth around $1.5 million in 2001, when he retired. It was then he turned his attention to real estate and resort development with one of his ambitious projects involving a 3,500 residential resort complete with two golf courses.

However, the project since ran into trouble and in 2010 was taken over by chief creditor HSBC Canada, with around $300 million owing to its creditors.

In the meantime, Len Barrie is also “under active investigation” for allegedly taking around $20 million from the  Bear Mountain company in order to pay for his share of the Tampa Bay Lightning team.

Breaking the figures down further, around 2.6 million people visited Louisiana casinos in December with revenue at the state’s 13 riverboat casinos declining by 1.7% to $138.6 million compared to last year. Meanwhile, revenue at the only land-based casino in the state,  Harrah’s, was also largely flat down 0.2% to $32.1 million, while the state’s four racetrack casinos similarly saw their revenue change by a mere margin, up 0.1% in December yoy to $31.2 million

Collectively, Louisiana casinos generated $2.37 billion in revenue in 2011, a figure largely the same as the year before. Furthermore, the amount excludes three Indian reservation  casinos which are exempt from publicly reporting their winnings.

At a time of economic downturn in the US, Louisiana casinos therefore appear to be weathering the storm well and chairman of the Louisiana Gaming Control Board, Dane Morgan, has stated that around $1 billion has already been earmarked for new casino projects and developments.

In addition, next year Louisiana is poised to benefit from a new 400 room hotel-casino, complete with a convention center and an 18-hole golf course. Currently, Las Vegas casino developer Creative Casinos is in the process of completing financing for the $400 million Mojito Pointe Casino Resort in Lake Charles, with construction scheduled to begin around February 18th and completion in 2013.

However, the Creative Casinos and MGM Resorts International collaboration is dependent on the funding first being there, and as Dan Lee from Creative Casinos explains:

“All of the commitments are contingent on us having all of the money. Nobody wants to own part of an unfinished building.”

The Las Vegas Strip generally accounts for around half the state’s revenue, and in November its casinos reported a 9% increase in gambling revenues to $495.3 million. This figure includes slot revenues increasing by 2.6% to $261 million and baccarat winnings rising by a massive 29.3% to $89 million.

However, despite the encouraging figures, baccarat was seen as being pivotal in driving up The Strips’ takings, while slots revenue is typically viewed as a better indicator for signs of recovery in the wider nongaming sector. As gaming analyst Chad Beynon from Macquarie Securities explains:

“While the headline growth rate of 9 percent is strong, we again would have liked to see a more broad-based growth story across all segments. In particular, the fact that slot handle was basically flat year-over-year was somewhat disappointing given the positive trends over the past two months.”

The disappointment was highlighted by the fact that November should have been a particularly busy month, with the WSOP Main Event Final Table having taken place, as well as the Manny Paquiao-Juan Manuel Marquez fight on November 12th.

Nonetheless, it is believed that the second consecutive month of rising gambling revenues for the Las Vegas Strip confirms positive sign of recovery for the whole state going into 2012. This was widely reflected across the board, with most of the gaming areas posting increases in revenue including Boulder Strip up 12.44% to $71.635 million, Washoe County up 1.95% to $53.5 million, and Mesquite up 4.18% to $9.868 million.

Just North Las Vegas was down by 4.7% to $23.075 million, and Laughlin down 1.87% to $38.609 million.

Overall, the State of Nevada saw a  15.2% increase in the amount of gambling taxes it collected for November, to $57 million. In addition,  Nevada gambling is currently showing a 2.9% increase in revenues for 2011, with just December’s results left to collect.

In addition, the 4.2% increase represented the highest monthly rise in revenue since December 2006, and commenting on the encouraging figures, Casino Association of New Jersey President Robert Griffin, said:

“December’s results clearly show that the future of Atlantic City is a bright one. This positive turnaround is a testament to the vast offerings of all the properties. I believe that we will look back at December 2011 as the beginning of the rebirth of Atlantic City.”

Throughout December, Atlantic City’s 11 casinos reported an 8.3% increase in slots revenue to $174.1 million, while table-games revenue actually fell by 4.3% to $72.5 million from a year earlier.

In total, seven of the 11 casinos posted an increase in revenue with Resorts Casino Hotel leading the way up 23.1% to almost $11 million, followed by The Borgata up 19.1% to nearly $56 million.  Out of the four casinos reporting a decline in revenue, Trump Plaza’s was the most dramatic at 14.9%, followed by ACH at 5.6%, Bally’s at 2.6% and Golden Nugget at 1.4%.

Overall, the increase in December’s revenue came too late to improve Atlantic City’s annual casino result, which was down 6.9% to $3.3 billion in 2011. It also marked five years of consecutive revenue decline for a city affected by the economic downturn in the US, as well as increased competition from neighboring states.

However, industry experts believe 2012 could mark the beginning of recovery for Atlantic City, especially factoring in the new $2.4 billion Revel casino scheduled to open in May.

Striking an optimistic tone for the future, Tropicana Casino and Resort president Tony Rodio, said: “We’ve been seeing this trend for a while now, the declines getting smaller, things getting a little bit better. We’ll have a lot of positive months sprinkled into 2012.”

In total, the former Portuguese colony has now recorded a 42% rise in its casino revenue to $33.5bn for the whole of 2011. Despite being lower than the 57.8% growth rate set in 2010, the casinos take was still higher than the amount taken last year of $23.5 billion.

Commenting on the latest impressive figures, Aaron Fischer from Asia’s leading investment group CLSA, said:

“Following the 57 per cent growth in Macao’s gaming revenue in 2010, nobody expected the market to grow at the rate that we have seen. At the beginning of 2011, we were expecting a 20 per cent growth for that year, and we were among the most bullish in the sector.”

Initially, during the year there had been concerns that gambling in Macau could suffer from a slow down in the Chinese economy, which has led to a credit squeeze, a slowdown in exports, and a negative effect on businesses and the property market.

However, Macau emerged unscathed from the economic situation with Chinese mainland visitors still prepared to travel to the country’s only legal gambling resort. Mr Fischer also speculated that a Chinese punter was likely to wager up to ten times more than his US counterpart, and commented:

“At the heart of Macao’s phenomenal growth was the Chinese people’s penchant for games of fortune. Revenues in the city’s casinos could eventually exceed the whole of the US market, which currently yields $60bn in a year.”

Looking ahead to 2012, analysts are envisaging a slow down in growth to between 15% and 25%, due to the already huge size of the market, as well as concerns as to whether high-roller customers will receive credit lines

There is myth which states that in times of hardship more people will resort to gambling. However, in a country which is €350 billion in debt and where spare money is hard to find, Greeks have instead started cutting back on the amounts they are prepared to wager at the casino. As a gaming industry insider explains:

“But there is certainly a crisis here, and it’s getting deeper… Greeks still want to gamble, but without spare money in their pockets to do so, bets are a fifth of what they were previously.”

Consequently, Greece’s nine casinos have experienced three consecutive year of decline, with revenue in 2011 dropping by 20% to €2.2 billion, around €1 billion lower than it was in 2008.

Breaking the figures down further, turnover at Greece’s leading casino Loutraki was down by 18%, Regency Mont Parnes was down 22.7%, while five other Greek casinos saw revenues fall by between 3.5% and 25.6%.

Commenting on the worrying situation, an Athens casino insider was recorded by news source greekreporter, as stating:

“We are hoping for an upswing in the economy. If the crisis doesn’t ease we’ll also have to make staff cuts. We can’t predict the situation for everyone but it’s realistic to assume that casinos will have to reduce their costs and investments if the crisis worsens.”

This also spells additional bad news for the Greek government, which receives between 20% and 33% of the casinos’ turnover as state revenues.

In addition to a drop in disposable income for Greeks, other factors which are seen contributing to the decline in Greece’s casinos, are illegal gambling and the proliferation of electronic gambling. These factors have also impacted on revenue derived from games of chance, such as state lotteries and horse racing, which too have shrunk by 20% to €7 billion, from €8.5 billion in 2010.