Jan. 16--ATLANTIC CITY, N.J.-- Defying predictions of the first yearly revenue decrease in the history of New Jersey casino gambling, Atlantic City's 12 casinos put together a strong finish to 2001 and managed to keep intact a 23-year streak of winning more from gamblers each year than the last, if just barely. 

Gamblers in Atlantic City lost $4.3 billion last year, a figure known as the "win" in the industry. That represents an increase of $2.2 million over 2000, or less than one-tenth of 1 percent, according to official figures released this week by the New Jersey Casino Control Commission. 

The rate of growth was the lowest in the history of the resort, but it represented a show of relative stability in a year marked by a slowing economy and the economic fallout of Sept. 11, which hit other gambling markets harder than Atlantic City. 

"One cannot deny that it was a strong finish to what was turning out to be a weak year," said Lawrence Klatzkin, an analyst with Jefferies & Co. in New York. "No one was up big or down big. The city was pretty much flat." 

The $4.3 billion in revenue translates to $342.3 million in taxes that the casinos pay to the state, including $27.6 million in December. That money goes into the state's Casino Revenue Fund to pay for programs for senior citizens and people with disabilities. 

In addition, the casinos put aside a required 1.25 percent of their revenue -- about $53.5 million in 2001 -- to reinvest in projects approved by the Casino Reinvestment Development Authority, a state agency. 

Among the casinos, Resorts showed the highest increase in revenue -- nearly 3 percent to a total of $243.7 million. The Claridge, Tropicana, and Trump Taj Mahal recorded revenue declines of just more than 2 percent compared with 2000. 

Revenue had increased more than 3 percent the previous three years. The city's biggest one-year jump occurred in 1995, when gamblers lost 9.5 percent more than they had the year before. 

The slight increase was made possible by a strong December, which surprised analysts, and made up for drop-offs in September and October of about 6.5 percent. In December alone, slot machine revenue rose nearly 17 percent to $245.1 million, while table revenues for the month increased by nearly 20 percent to $102.7 million. 

"What happened is that they had a phenomenal New Year's weekend," said Daniel Heneghan, director of communications for the Casino Control Commission. "It apparently was a combination of good weather, good luck, and a good calendar that made it a very good weekend." 

About 73 percent of casinos' winnings came at the slots, despite the machines' paying out at a higher rate than ever before, returning just shy of 92 percent of wagers back to gamblers. 

Overall, gamblers lost $3.14 billion at the slots, an increase of nearly 2 percent over 2000. Revenues at table games -- blackjack and craps, for example -- declined 4 percent to $1.16 billion, the second-worst in the city's history, next to a 7 percent decline in 1991. 

Klatzkin, the Jefferies & Co. analyst, said that though casinos had loosened up the slots somewhat, they had resisted an all-out marketing war and had tamed their sometimes-runaway promotional wars for bus customers. 

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(c) 2002, The Philadelphia Inquirer. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.