Caesars files with SEC to sell 7 million shares of stock
Caesars Entertainment Corp. filed paperwork with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday to sell an additional 7 million shares of stock.
Based on Thursday’s closing price on Nasdaq, the company would raise almost $148 million.
No date was given for the proposed sale. Caesars and its private equity owners, TPG Capital and Apollo Global Management, agreed to a 60-day lock-up period after the date of the prospectus filing in which they wouldn’t sell any of their wholly owned shares.
Caesars has made several efforts recently to repair its balance sheet, which has a gaming-industry-high $23 billion in debt.
Caesars said Wednesday its Caesars Growth Partners is seeking $1.3 billion in loans to fund the purchase of four casinos announced this month. In the same SEC filing, the company said a group of “unidentified note holders” want to kill off the casino operator’s growth-oriented affiliate.
Caesars Entertainment owns 58 percent of Caesars Growth Partners, which was created to help repair the company’s balance sheet. Caesars Growth Partners owns Planet Hollywood Resort, the under-construction Horseshoe Baltimore, a hotel tower at Caesars Palace and the company’s interactive gaming business, which includes its online gaming operations in Nevada and New Jersey.
Caesars Growth Partners said the loan would be used to acquire Bally’s Las Vegas, The Quad, The Cromwell and Harrah’s New Orleans in a $2.2 billion transaction. Caesars Entertainment said it would use proceeds from the sale to pay down debt.
Separately, Caesars said Wednesday that it would close its Harrah’s Tunica casino in Mississippi in the face of increased regional competition and declining revenue.
On Friday, Caesars shares slipped $1.56, or 7.4 percent, to close at $19.52 on Nasdaq.
Contact reporter Howard Stutz at hstutz@reviewjournal.com or 702-477-3871. Follow @howardstutz on Twitter.
