It’s a great day if you own a lot of Harrah’s stock–especially if you bought it back in 1998, when it was trading at around $20 a share. The company has reportedly accepted a buyout offer. This breaking news comes from the IHT:

Harrah’s Entertainment Inc., the world’s largest casino company, has agreed to a $90 per share buyout offer from two private equity groups, said a person with knowledge of the negotiations.

The agreement with Apollo Management Group and Texas Pacific Group came late last week but lawyers for both sides have been working out the details, said the person, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the talks.

An official announcement on the deal could come as early as Tuesday, the person said Monday.

The deal values Harrah’s at $16.7 billion (€12.75 billion).

Harrah’s said to accept $90 per share buyout by Apollo, Texas Pacific Group – Business – International Herald Tribune

I’ve heard that the new owners will keep the existing management team in place, but there’s no consensus over whether Harrah’s plans for the Center Strip will continue or are on hold. There’s solid reasons to go either way, and until there’s an official announcement, it’s anyone’s guess. If I were a betting man, I’d lay odds on the sale of the Rio and possibly Showboat (Atlantic City), if anything. I’d be astounded if anything from the Center Strip is sold.

One question no one has asked yet (at least that I’m aware of) is what this means for the World Series of Poker. Everyone is assuming that the new Harrah’s will keep the poker tournament, but on the balance sheet it’s just another property that, for the right price, might be up for grabs. I haven’t even heard rumors about this so far, but you’ve got to admit that there is at least a possibility that this asset, which includes no real estate, could be sold if the company wants to concentrate on maximixing its Strip and near-Strip land holdings.

There was a good piece on the coming of slot casinos to Philadelphia in USA Today:

Visitors come here to see just one bell — the Liberty Bell. Soon they’ll be looking for a row of them — on a slot machine.

Pennsylvania’s 2-year-old state gaming board is to award licenses Wednesday for two slot machine casinos to be built here. That will make Philadelphia the largest city in the country with casinos and put legalized gaming within 2 miles of Independence Hall, where the founding fathers gambled their fortunes on revolution.

The arrival of slots parlors here is part of the spread of gambling through the mid-Atlantic. New Jersey, New York and Connecticut have casinos. Pennsylvania and Delaware have slots at racetracks, and Maryland’s incoming governor wants to do the same.

In Philadelphia, founded by Quakers whose religious beliefs prohibit gambling, slots casinos are facing a cold welcome from the neighbors.

In Pennsport, the riverfront neighborhood where Rene Goodwin lives in a 19th-century brick row house, the elevated bulk of Interstate 95 separates narrow residential streets from big-box stores and the city’s container port. One of the casinos is proposed for a vacant site next to Wal-Mart.

“It isn’t this hinterland,” says Goodwin, who leads Riverfront Communities United, a group of seven neighborhood associations. Pennsport would be overwhelmed by traffic and crime if the slots parlor is built two blocks away, she says. “It’s a real place, where people know each other. … Is it worth destroying one of the best neighborhoods in the city for a casino?”

Five proposals are competing for the two licenses. The developers include Donald Trump; the Pequot tribe, which runs Foxwoods Casino in Connecticut; and the owner of Philadelphia’s two daily newspapers. Four of the proposed slots parlors would be built along the Delaware River, and the fifth would be across town, closer to wealthy suburbs.

Philly to be largest gambling city – USATODAY.com

You’ve got to wonder what this will do to Atlantic City. Now, more than ever, is the time to broaden the appeal beyond slot machines. There’s been a great start with Borgata, but the ultimate fate of the city as destination may rest with the next generation of resorts–whatever replaces the Sands, and several other projects on the drawing board.