Two years after selling Mirage Resorts to MGM Grand for $6.4 billion, the casino developer filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Monday to take Wynn Resorts Ltd. public in a $408-million offering on the Nasdaq and then use the money to help finance Le Reve, a planned $2.4-billion Las Vegas mega-resort that would rival MGM's Bellagio, Mirage and Treasure Island casinos.
La Reve, French for "The Dream," is planned for the Las Vegas Strip on the site of the former Desert Inn that Wynn acquired in 2000. It is scheduled to break ground in 2003 and open in 2005. At five million sf, The Dream would be larger than Mirage and smaller than Bellagio.Amenities are to include a 45-story hotel with 2,400 rooms, a casino with 2000 slots, 18 restaurants, two wedding chapels, an 18-hole golf course, a three-acre lake, a man-made mountain, a Ferrari and Maserati dealership and an art gallery filled with selection from Wynn's private collection.
Wynn, whose last name is also the proposed ticker symbol, told the SEC he aims to raise as much as $408 million by going public and then supplement that with $350 million in mortgage notes, while the rest would be financed using money from existing investors, according to the filing. The preliminary SEC filing did not detail the number of shares to be sold or the price range. The investment banks involved are Deutsche Banc Securities, Bear Stearns, Banc of America Securities and Dresdner Kleinwort.
Wynn Resorts, 47% owned by Chairman Wynn, is also in negotiations with the government of Macau to invest $500-million in one or more casinos there. Industry sources tell GlobeSt.com it's rare for a developer to sell stock based on a project that isn't at least under construction, but they also say Wynn is the rare breed that can make it happen regardless of the current market for IPOs or tourism, both of which are tenuous.
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