Las Vegas-based Pinnacle Entertainment axed plans to build a multimillion-dollar casino complex here, saying the project was on indefinite hold due to the continued slump in the credit market, according to a report in the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
Pinnacle, which operates casinos primarily in the South and Midwest, reported a net loss of $11.8 million in the three months ended Sept. 30, reversing a net income of $5 million a year earlier. The company took a hit in August and September, when hurricanes Gustav and Ike closed Pinnacle’s casinos in New Orleans and Lake Charles, La., for several days.
Pinnacle bought the former Sands Hotel Casino in Atlantic City and demolished it in October 2007 to make way for a large casino-hotel project on the Boardwalk. According to one Associated Press report, the project was on shaky ground as early as February 2008, when Pinnacle CEO Daniel Lee said the firm could conceivably abandon the project if funding remained difficult for an extended period of time.
