The lingering impact of the smoking ban, the economy, and 1 less weekend day drove revenues down 13% year-over-year in March. However, same store revenue declined only 9%. The same store calculation excludes PENN's Joliet Empress which lost a ½ month's of revenue due to fire, and the new Jumer's permanent facility.
Illinois is likely to chug along at the down mid single digit pace, making it one of the worst performing regional markets. The good news is that revenue declines are "less bad", that is, the delta is positive. Moreover, the 6 month moving average is moving in the right direction, sloping upward since December 2008.
Boyd Gaming's (BYD) casino in East Peoria was the standout with a revenue decline of only 4%. For the quarter, Par-A-Dice is down 4%, in-line with our projection.
