{"id":23697,"date":"2014-08-07T05:20:38","date_gmt":"2014-08-07T05:20:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/?p=23697"},"modified":"2014-08-07T05:34:59","modified_gmt":"2014-08-07T05:34:59","slug":"caesars-war-investors-24-billion-debt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/caesars-war-investors-24-billion-debt\/","title":{"rendered":"Caesars at War with Investors Over $24 Billion Debt"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_23701\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-23701\" data-style=\"width: 408px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-23701 \" src=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/08\/Gary-Loveman.jpg\" alt=\"Caesars Entertainment CEO Gary Loveman\" width=\"408\" height=\"250\" \/><figcaption  id=\"caption-attachment-23701\"class=\"text-description\">Caesars CEO Gary Loveman says his company will not be held hostage by speculators. (Image: Jonathan Alcorn\/Bloomberg)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>The battle between Caesars Entertainment and its bondholders was ramped up a notch this week as the casino giant filed a lawsuit against a large portion of its investors, claiming they are attempting to impede the company&#8217;s efforts to restructure its debt process, a process that is necessary to avoid bankruptcy.<\/p>\n<p>Despite being the best-known casino company in the world, Caesars&#8217; long-term debt is colossal, standing at an industry all-time high of $23 billion, which outstrips the bankrupt city of Detroit. In May, the company announced a process of debt restructuring, which, while not eliminating any long-term debt, would wipe out more than $1 billion of payments due in 2015.<\/p>\n<p>The process, according to Caesars Chairman and CEO <a title=\"No Bankruptcy for Caesars Says Loveman - reviewjournal.com Nov. 2013\" href=\"http:\/\/www.reviewjournal.com\/business\/loveman-no-bankruptcy-seen-caesars-entertainment-corp\" target=\"_blank\">Gary Loveman<\/a>, would \u201clay the foundation for both significant de-leveraging and value creation at Caesars Entertainment.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2>Lend Us Your Ears&#8230;and Everything Else<\/h2>\n<p>\u201cUpon completion of the credit facility amendment \u2026 Caesars will have added headroom under its maintenance covenant, providing Caesars with additional stability to execute its business plan,\u201d he added. \u201cIf Caesars successfully lists its equity securities, this independent listing should help facilitate the eventual raising of equity as well as liability management and debt reduction initiatives.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>However, as Moody&#8217;s Investment analyst Peggy Holloway said at the time, this leaves the bondholders in the lurch.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"main-blockquote\"><p>\u201cRecent asset sales by Caesars\u2019 private equity sponsors are weakening the hand that creditors will bring to the table in the casino company\u2019s inevitable restructuring,\u201d Holloway said. \u201cThe transactions are reducing the asset base underlying the debt, which will likely lead to deeper losses for lenders and bondholders upon a default.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Over two dozen investment firms were named in the lawsuit, all of which, Caesars claimed, have &#8220;sought to injure\u201d the company through such means as the issue of demand letters, &#8220;disruptive&#8221; calls to appear before gaming regulators and one &#8220;baseless&#8221; default notice. Caesars claims these tactics have been &#8220;apparently designed&#8221; to push it into default.<\/p>\n<h2>No Hostage-Taking<\/h2>\n<p>\u201cWe refuse to be held hostage by speculators who appear to be betting against the long-term health of our enterprise as well as our more than 60,000 employees and the communities in which we operate,\u201d Loveman said. \u201cNeither Caesars nor CEOC [the operating company] have ever missed an interest or principal payment despite the extremely challenging environment. The meritless actions taken by the defendants impede our ability to conduct rational negotiations with holders to further improve CEOC&#8217;s financial condition.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Loveman added that Caesars had completed more than 50 capital markets transactions to improve its <a title=\"Debt-ridden Caesars Entertainment - nypost.com Nov. 2013\" href=\"http:\/\/nypost.com\/2013\/11\/01\/debt-ridden-caesars-buried-in-financial-woes\/\" target=\"_blank\">financial condition<\/a> and that it has also taken steps to enhance operating performance.<\/p>\n<p>The company acquired most of its debt when it became private in 2008, after a $30.1 billion takeover by Apollo Global Management and TPG Capital, just as the economic downturn hit. As the recession ravaged the land-based casino industry in America, Caesars, with its 50 casinos across the US, was hit the hardest.<\/p>\n<p>Posting its first quarter results this year, the company said it lost $386.4 million in the quarter that ended March 31, a loss of $2.82 per share. Meanwhile, shares in the company hit a 52-week low on Tuesday before closing at $12.71, down 9.54 percent.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The battle between Caesars Entertainment and its bondholders was ramped up a notch this week as the casino giant filed a lawsuit against a large portion of its investors, claiming they are attempting to impede the company&#8217;s efforts to restructure its debt process, a process that is necessary to avoid bankruptcy. Despite being the best-known [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":42,"featured_media":23701,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,13,18],"tags":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Caesars at War with Investors Over $24 Billion Debt<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Caesars Entertainment files lawsuit against bondholders over debt restructure.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Caesars at War with Investors Over $24 Billion Debt\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Caesars Entertainment files lawsuit against bondholders over debt restructure.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/caesars-war-investors-24-billion-debt\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Casino.org\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/Casino.OrgNews\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-08-07T05:20:38+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2014-08-07T05:34:59+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/08\/Gary-Loveman.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"640\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"427\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Casino.org Staff Writer\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@Casino_Org\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@Casino_Org\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Casino.org Staff Writer\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/caesars-war-investors-24-billion-debt\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/caesars-war-investors-24-billion-debt\/\",\"name\":\"Caesars at War with Investors Over $24 Billion Debt\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/caesars-war-investors-24-billion-debt\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/caesars-war-investors-24-billion-debt\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/08\/Gary-Loveman.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2014-08-07T05:20:38+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2014-08-07T05:34:59+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/8c48bf89dc86da77b4d856c7b3b78d77\"},\"description\":\"Caesars Entertainment files lawsuit against bondholders over debt restructure.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/caesars-war-investors-24-billion-debt\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/caesars-war-investors-24-billion-debt\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/caesars-war-investors-24-billion-debt\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/08\/Gary-Loveman.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/08\/Gary-Loveman.jpg\",\"width\":640,\"height\":427,\"caption\":\"Caesars CEO Gary Loveman says his company will not be held hostage by speculators. 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