“I found that I not only tolerated risks, but I loved it….”
William Simon, US Secretary of the Treasury (1974-1977)
At various times in my long gaming career I have been a customer, a consultant and an analyst in the slot machine business. As a gaming executive beginning in the 1980s I checked out casino floors which still, in dead zones, had a row of the old “narrow body” Mills-Jennings slots. Those antiques dated back to Las Vegas movie scenes I remember as a kid with handles that cranked like old Model T Fords when pulled. As technology exploded, they were swept away by the new “wide body” models manufactured by leaders like the old Ballys, the Aristocrats out of Australia, the Universals out of Japan. All had new bells and whistles to enhance playability. And then came the breakaway video pokers and blackjack machines by upstart International Game Technology(IGT). Their stock quickly became a Wall Street darling because of the speed with which they became popular and spread over casino floors globally.
I cite this background to put context into the rationale I brought to an SA article on PlayAGS (NYSE:AGS) I published on May 14,2019. That day the stock was trading at $20.19. My thesis then was this: In a world of giants, this was one little engine that could, a company that established at nice niche leasing revenue sharing slots in tribal casinos with highly playable equipment, among other reasons.
Now a year and a half later, the stock is trading today at $6.50, a huge miss on my part but one with a traceable history of unknown headwinds at the time of my call. No excuses here, it is what it is. Since then I have followed the gaming machine sub-sector and taken another look at PlayAGS (
The House Edge Moves Ahead
As of April 2020, my public picks are
- Returning 20.8% on average
- producing a 68% hit rate
- ranked in the top 1% of bloggers.
I share those picks early with members, as well as deep dive research and analysis based on my decades of industry experience.
To ensure the utmost quality for The House Edge, we are going to be raising prices on June 1st.
Sign up now and get in for a bargain basement price of $199/year. Get the House Edge on your side!
