Las Vegas Sands Corp., owner of the Venetian Casino Resort in Las Vegas and Sands Macau in China's former Portuguese enclave, raised $690 million in the biggest initial public offering by a U.S. gaming company.
The company, whose Macau project was Asia's first Las Vegas-style casino, sold 24 million shares at $29 each, compared with a price range of between $24 and $26, according to bankers involved in the sale. Chief executive officer Sheldon Adelson, 71, and his family will have an 87.9 percent stake in the company after the IPO, a regulatory filing said.
"The Venetian is one of the most impressive gaming buildings in the world," said Eric Hausler, an analyst at Susquehanna Financial Group in New York. Adelson "had the vision to cater the property to the higher-end convention users."
The IPO, bigger than developer Steve Wynn's $450 million IPO of Wynn Resorts Ltd. two years ago, will help Las Vegas Sands develop projects in Macau and the U.K., according to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing. Wynn plans to open the Wynn Macau in two years.
Las Vegas Sands is seeking to duplicate the glitz of Las Vegas's famous "strip" on reclaimed land lying between Macau's Taipa and Coloane islands. The city's gambling industry is reviving after the local government in 2002 ended a four-decade gambling monopoly held by local casino tycoon Stanley Ho.
In Las Vegas, which had 35.5 million visitors last year, Las Vegas Sands is developing the Palazzo Casino Resort, a 50-floor hotel with 3,025 rooms and a 105,000-square-foot gaming facility. The Venetian Casino has 4,027 suites, 2,000 slot machines and 139 table games and 1.8 million square feet of meeting and convention space.
Sands Macau has 329 table games and about 670 slot machines or similar gaming devices. The company intends to build a hotel and convention center with 3,000 suites, 546,000 square feet of gaming facilities and 1 million square feet of gross retail space.