Nevada casino win up 11.2 percent

Nevada’s gaming win jumped up nearly 11.2 percent in August as casinos raked in $955.3 million.

The Carson Valley area, which includes valley portions of Douglas County, also saw an increase, but only by a modest 1.3 percent. Carson City brought in $8.76 million.

While game and table play are only a small portion of Carson’s gaming revenue, that win dropped 8.4 percent in August to just $570,000. That decrease was only barely offset by the 2 percent gain in slot win, which accounts for the remaining $8.2 million.

After four months of year-over-year declines, this is Carson’s fourth straight month increase in win.

Statewide, win was up dramatically, led by $589 million on the Strip, just a fraction shy of 20 percent up from a year ago. And on the Strip, the story was Baccarat, which recorded the fourth-largest win in history at $193.6 million, up $69.2 million over that category a year ago. Even tough the volume bet on Baccarat was down by about $13 million, the casinos held nearly 19 percent of everything wagered, compared with 12 percent a year ago.

Even without Baccarat, however, total win was up 3.7 percent. Gaming Control Board Analyst Mike Lawton said that means the other games including “21” and craps had a good month.

The totals were helped by the fact the month this year had one more Saturday than August 2012.

Slot win totaled $527.1 million, down 2.7 percent.

Washoe County reported the largest win total since August 2009, at $73.8 million. That is 8.4 percent up from a year ago. Lawton credited a strong turnout for Hot August Nights this year along with the extra Saturday. Washoe has now been up five of the past six months.

North Lake Tahoe casinos also posted an increase, their seventh in the past eight months. In August, the north shore casinos were up 9.4 percent, to $3.57 million.

South Shore casinos at Stateline were down 2.7 percent on a decrease in slot machine win.

Churchill County casinos reported an 8.64 percent increase in total win. Game and table win was up a whopping 48.56 percent, but that only accounts for $54,000 of the $1.78 million in win by the 10 non-restricted gaming locations in Churchill. Slot win was up 7.6 percent there, bringing in the remaining $1.73 million in win.