Regional casino saturation to put added pressure on Atlantic City in coming years

Atlantic City will face more casino closures thanks to increased competition from new casinos in the US northeast, according to a new report.

On Monday, Moody’s Investors Service released a report noting that there were eight new casinos set to open over the next three years in Maryland, Massachusetts, New York and Pennsylvania. Moody’s believes the regional market is already saturated and further competition will hurt all existing casinos, but AC is expected to bear the brunt of it.

Moody’s notes that AC’s eight surviving casinos have fared much better since four of their competitors shut their doors in 2014. But the new casinos in neighboring states will heap more pressure on AC’s fragile recovery and Moody’s suggested the Trump Taj Mahal, Caesars and Bally’s venues are the most likely candidates for closure.

Moody’s didn’t see only losers from all this expansion, noting that gaming device makers like International Game Technology, Scientific Games and Aristocrat Technologies are licking their lips at the thought of orders for 20k new slot machines to fill these eight new gaming venues. So what if no one actually ends up using them? Sell, sell, sell!