3 Reasons to Buy Las Vegas Sands Today

By Dave Mock
November 20, 2009 | Comments (2)

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Historically, tumultuous times offer some of the best opportunities to buy stocks, and the market's recent mess surely qualifies. Many investors are keeping their distance from casino and gaming stocks these days, but a good deal still think there's value in casino operator Las Vegas Sands (NYSE: LVS).

In our Motley Fool CAPS community, nearly 81% of the 1,662 investors rating the company remain bullish, so there's no shortage of reasons Las Vegas Sands will thrive, three of which I've highlighted below.

But here at The Motley Fool, we're all for looking at both the good and bad sides of an investment. Once you're done with this article, you can read the case against the stock, weigh in with your own comments below, or rate Las Vegas Sands yourself in CAPS.

1. Macau
Las Vegas Sands has a growing presence in the booming city of Macau, which is its biggest source of revenue. It plans to restart stalled construction on its new resorts in January, with the first phase opening in mid-2011. Like Melco Crown Entertainment (Nasdaq: MPEL), the company plans to continue building there and eventually expects to have a total of 20,000 hotel rooms in the area, a gambling haven that provides big opportunities for many operators.

2. The house always wins
Despite a struggling Las Vegas casino industry that had an effect on operators like Las Vegas Sands, MGM Mirage (NYSE: MGM), Boyd Gaming (NYSE: BYD), and Wynn Resorts (Nasdaq: WYNN), some metrics show that the decline is slowing and thereby lead some to believe that the worst may be over. Las Vegas Sands already sees an improvement in 2010 bookings, and some CAPS members believe that the city of Las Vegas will regain its popularity with people looking to roll the dice.

3. Skin in the game
Similar to Jeff Bezos' ownership in Amazon.com (Nasdaq: AMZN) and Warren Buffet's massive stake in Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK-B), CAPS members like that Sheldon Adelson and his family are playing for the shareholders. The family invested hundreds of millions more in the company last year to help it survive and added more shares to their already large stake earlier this year.  

To see details of what CAPS members are saying now about Las Vegas Sands, just head on over to Motley Fool CAPS and have a look -- or add your own thoughts in the comments box below.

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Fool contributor Dave Mock needs a few more good reasons to keep up his tanning-booth habit. He owns no shares of companies mentioned here. Amazon.com and Berkshire Hathaway are Stock Advisor selections. Berkshire Hathaway is an Inside Value recommendation. Melco Crown Entertainment is a Global Gains recommendation. The Fool owns shares of Berkshire Hathaway. The Fool's disclosure policy won the county bubble-blowing championship.

Comments from our Foolish Readers

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  • Report this Comment On November 20, 2009, at 5:03 PM, termin8r03 wrote:

    I will say that LVS has an advantage over others in Macau.

    From personal experience (I was there in March), the Sands and the Venetian Macau were full of gamblers. My wife and I walked through several of the casinos in the area and those 2 were by far the most packed. The Wynn looked like a ghost town and the local casinos weren't all that much better. I don't know what it was about those 2, but if LVS can keep that up with the resorts in the future, they can gain some significant market share.

    BTW, this was on a random Tuesday so I would assume that the weekends and holidays would be even more packed.

  • Report this Comment On December 04, 2009, at 2:26 PM, JF125780 wrote:

    I have followed the gaming stocks for many years and I'm invested in LVS, MGM, WYNN and BYD.

    I see a great future for anyone who invest in these companies, especially LVS which is opening in Singapore in the first quarter of 2010.

    LVS in my opinion will move above 200. a share in a couple of years. My concern is what would prevent Sheldon from buying the company at a premium of say 30. a share as the economy starts to get better?.

    Sheldon Adelson and the insiders own 71% of the company now.

    Dan Kowkabany

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Related Tickers

2/10/2010 11:06 AM
LVS $15.82 Down -0.07 -0.44%
Las Vegas Sands Co… CAPS Rating: **
BRK-B $74.44 Down -0.09 -0.12%
Berkshire Hathaway… CAPS Rating: *****
AMZN $116.56 Down -1.47 -1.24%
Amazon.com, Inc. CAPS Rating: **
WYNN $61.32 Down -0.31 -0.50%
Wynn Resorts, Limi… CAPS Rating: *
MGM $10.40 Down -0.32 -2.99%
MGM Mirage CAPS Rating: **
MPEL $3.60 Up +0.08 +2.27%
Melco Crown Entert… CAPS Rating: ****
BYD $7.64 Up +0.03 +0.39%
Boyd Gaming Corp CAPS Rating: **

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