Sep. 18, 2003 - Mandalay Resort Group President and CFO Glenn Schaeffer said Wednesday at the Global Gaming Expo that his company is unlikely to consider building in Atlantic City any time soon.

"Our destiny is on the Las Vegas Strip," Schaeffer said, noting that it will be a couple of years before the company begins building its long-awaited Project Z, a new resort the company plans for the northwest corner of the intersection of Russell Road and the Strip.

MGM Mirage President and CFO Jim Murren got in a subtle dig at former Mirage Resorts boss Steve Wynn, who is building a $2 billion megaresort expected to target MGM Mirage's dominance of the high-end market.

Murren said MGM Mirage will soon decide whether to build next in Atlantic City or at its 55-acre site on the Strip, now occupied by the Boardwalk hotel-casino.

"Certainly by the time of this conference next year we'll have decided where we're going to go," said Murren, a veteran of the MGM Grand-side of the eventual union with Mirage Resorts.

Asked why the company wouldn't build in both Las Vegas and New Jersey at the same time as did Wynn when he built Bellagio and Beau Rivage in Biloxi, Miss., Murren had a quick retort.

"That's why we changed the name of the company," he said.

Schaeffer took a playful swipe at Harrah's Entertainment and MGM Mirage, two companies that have announced deals to develop casinos in the United Kingdom.

"I think they're making a bid on the British Empire," Schaeffer deadpanned.

Harrah's CEO Gary Loveman said the company likes the Las Vegas locals market, but can't figure out a practical way to break into it.

Good locals casino sites are mostly controlled by Station, and state neighborhood gaming rules likely limit new developments outside designated gaming zones.

"Access to sites is quite limited," Loveman said. "I don't know how to get into the market, so I doubt we'll be big players."

CNN talk show host Larry King raised some eyebrows along with a lot of laughter when, hosting the G2E's annual State of the Industry panel discussion, he told National Indian Gaming Commission Chairman Ernie Stevens in a lighthearted way that he'd always suspected the Indians were, as King is, really Jewish.

Later, Stevens answered a question about the role of women in casino management.

"Our chiefs don't do anything without checking with our women," Stevens said.

"Further proof of my Jewish theory," King chimed.

Stevens also called Time magazine a "tabloid." Time is owned by AOL Time-Warner, the conglomerate that owns CNN. The magazine published an expose on tribal gaming last year, an effort tribal leaders considered unfair and full of errors.

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