NASDAQ:CNTY Century Casinos Q3 2025 Earnings Report $1.11 0.00 (0.00%) Closing price 04:00 PM EasternExtended Trading$1.12 +0.01 (+0.63%) As of 05:04 PM Eastern Extended trading is trading that happens on electronic markets outside of regular trading hours. This is a fair market value extended hours price provided by Massive. Learn more. ProfileEarnings HistoryForecast Century Casinos EPS ResultsActual EPS-$0.35Consensus EPS -$0.28Beat/MissMissed by -$0.07One Year Ago EPSN/ACentury Casinos Revenue ResultsActual Revenue$153.72 millionExpected Revenue$165.70 millionBeat/MissMissed by -$11.98 millionYoY Revenue GrowthN/ACentury Casinos Announcement DetailsQuarterQ3 2025Date11/10/2025TimeBefore Market OpensConference Call DateTuesday, November 11, 2025Conference Call Time10:00AM ETUpcoming EarningsCentury Casinos' Q3 2026 earnings is estimated for Friday, November 6, 2026, based on past reporting schedules, with a conference call scheduled at 9:30 AM ET. Check back for transcripts, audio, and key financial metrics as they become available.Conference Call ResourcesConference Call AudioConference Call TranscriptSlide DeckPress Release (8-K)Quarterly Report (10-Q)Earnings HistoryCompany ProfileSlide DeckFull Screen Slide DeckPowered by Century Casinos Q3 2025 Earnings Call TranscriptProvided by QuartrNovember 11, 2025ShareShareShare This ReportLink copied to clipboard.Key Takeaways Positive Sentiment: Q3 net operating revenue was $154 million; headline EBITDA declined due to Poland and one‑time September items, but management says that adjusting for those effects Q3 EBITDA would have risen ~5%, beating consensus and showing ongoing operating momentum. Positive Sentiment: Customer mix is improving: high‑value and core segments grew (high/up 8%), visits from those segments rose ~4%, and retail play increased 4%, helping offset a 9% decline in lower‑end players and supporting U.S. GGR growth of ~2%. Negative Sentiment: Poland remains a drag this quarter—closure of the Warsaw Hilton casino turned last year’s +$1.3M EBITDA into a -$0.5M result this period; the company says it is committed to divesting Poland even though current licenses run through 2028. Negative Sentiment: Balance sheet and governance items: cash fell to $78M (from $85M), total debt is $339M (net debt $261M) with a net debt/EBITDA of 6.9x AI Generated. May Contain Errors.Conference Call Audio Live Call not available Earnings Conference CallCentury Casinos Q3 202500:00 / 00:00Speed:1x1.25x1.5x2xTranscript SectionsPresentationParticipantsPresentationSkip to Participants Operator00:00:00Good day, everyone, and welcome to today's Century Casinos Q3 2025 earnings call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Later, you'll have the opportunity to ask questions during the question-and-answer session. You may register to ask a question at any time by pressing the star and one on your telephone keypad. Please note this call is being recorded, and I will be standing by if you should need any assistance. It is now my pleasure to turn the conference over to Peter Hoetzinger. Please go ahead. Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:00:33Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining our earnings call. We would like to remind everyone that we will be discussing forward-looking information under the Sfe Harbor provisions of the U.S. federal securities laws. The company undertakes no obligation to update or revise the forward-looking statements, and actual results may differ from those projected. Throughout our call, we refer to several non-GAAP financial measures, including, but not limited to, Adjusted EBITDA. Reconciliations of our non-GAAP measures to the appropriate GAAP measures can be found in our news releases and SEC filings available in the investor section of our website at cny.com. With me today are my Co-CEO, Erwin Haitzmann, and our Chief Financial Officer, Margaret Stapleton. After our prepared remarks, we'll open the call for questions from analysts. We announced solid third-quarter results yesterday afternoon. Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:01:35Net operating revenue was $154 million, driven by strength in the East and Midwest regions, as well as in Canada, offset by weakness in the West region and in Poland. The quarter started out really well. EBITDA in July was up 7%. August was even better, with EBITDA up 22%. September saw a sharp year-over-year decline due to the following one-time effects. In September of last year, Colorado received a $1 million breakup fee from Tipico. Also in September of last year, Mountaineer had a bonus accrual for $500,000 reversed. This September, Poland had extra costs but no revenue from a closed casino. As such, you can attribute the EBITDA decline in Q3 all to Poland and the one-time effects in September I just mentioned. Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:02:38Adjusting for those, Q3 EBITDA would have increased by about 5%, beating consensus estimates and demonstrating the continued operating momentum across various segments of our business. Not bad at all, definitely better than it looks at first sight. During the third quarter, the play from our high-value and core customers continued its long-term growth trend, but we did not see further improvements from our low-end customers. The upper customer segments continued to perform well, showing 8% growth, helping to offset a 9% decline in the lower-end segments. Therefore, total rated GGR was essentially flat. Retail play increased by 4%, resulting in a 2% GGR increase across the U.S. portfolio. Visitation statistics show a similar picture. Visits by high-value and core customers increased 4%, while visits from low-segment players declined. Before I hand it over to Erwin, let me come back to Poland for a second. Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:03:51From now on, no license expirations are coming up for at least three years, so Poland should be at its normalized EBITDA run rate for many quarters to come. In any case, however, we remain committed to divesting our Poland operations and will provide updates on the divestment process in the coming months as appropriate. Now over to Erwin for more color on our individual properties and markets. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:04:18Thank you, Peter, and good morning, everyone. Let me start with our results for the third quarter beginning in Missouri. Our Century Casino & Hotel Caruthersville which just celebrated its first anniversary, continues to exceed expectations. Gaming revenue grew strongly across all segments: high-value up 82%, core up 29%, and retail up 22%. In total, gaming revenue was 29% higher than last year, and EBITDA increased 35% to $6.1 million, up from $4.5 million. Rent expense rose about $1.1 million, reflecting the VG lease that funded the new property, and operating margins remain high. It is worth noting that with our new land-based facilities, we're now reaching new markets. This is particularly evident in the significant increase in customers leaving 75+ mi from Caruthersville. Caruthersville has been an outstanding success, modern, efficient, and exceptionally well-received by our guests. Our thanks to the entire team for a fantastic first year. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:05:34Now to Century Casinos & Hotel Cape Girardeau. Cape delivered $6.1 million in EBITDA, only slightly below last year's record quarter. The property continues to perform very well against competition from Illinois. Sports betting launches in Missouri on December 1, and in partnership with BetMGM, we will open a BetMGM-branded sportsbook on property, and BetMGM will launch its online sportsbook using our skin. We expect sports betting to elevate Cape's profile and create new revenue streams for the property. Now moving to Colorado. At Cripple Creek, EBITDA was $1.8 million, flat year-over-year. In the quarter, our high-value and core segments grew, while base and retail declined. Retail play now represents about 30% of total gaming revenue. We believe that Chamonix may capture a larger share of the retail market, still driven by the novelty effect. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:06:41At Century City, rated play was up 6%, but total revenue was down 4%, again due to fewer retail players. EBITDA came in at $1.2 million, up 20% on a comparable basis, as last year's EBITDA of $2 million included a $1 million one-time payment from Tipico. At both Colorado properties, we have replaced live table games with electronic table lounges, which generate about the same revenue at significantly lower cost. That's a solid win for both operations. Now to the East. At Mountaineer in West Virginia, EBITDA was $4.4 million, flat to last year. Apples to apples, though, EBITDA was up $500,000, as last year's EBITDA was inflated by the reversal of a $500,000 bonus accrual. Performance across the board was steady, and parimutuel handle rose 26%, driven by improved scheduling and race mix. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:07:49At Rocky Gap in Maryland, EBITDA increased 7% to $4.9 million, as we expected our first team quarter without weather disruptions since the beginning of the year. Growth came from high-value players, while other segments held steady. Now to the West and the Nugget Casino Resort in Reno-Sparks. While the Nugget had a standout August, mainly due to our signature Best-in-the-West Nugget Rib Cook-off, overall, the quarter was still challenging. We experienced a record EBITDA for August of $4.1 million, the highest single-month result in nearly three years, but that was offset by weaker July and September. Throughout the quarter, we enhanced marketing programs to grow both local and destination play. We're also building out our 2026 concert season. Tickets for Brooks & Dunn in April are already selling extremely well. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:08:51We began converting unused space into an additional 11,000 sq ft of convention space, a 10% increase in square footage to be completed by year-end. The additional space will first be used by a major group event that is booked for January 2026. At the Nugget, we're executing on a clear repositioning strategy, shifting away from low-ADD players who are no longer profitable and focusing on core players in Reno-Sparks and Northern California. In sync with the enhanced marketing to players in the core segment, we're working on further improving the F&B offerings. It takes time, but we're starting to see the results already. Now to Canada and Europe. In Alberta, slot coining was up 5.8%, total revenue up 1.6%, and EBITDA up 11.1% to $5.4 million. Growth was broad-based, supported by disciplined cost management. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:09:59Century Downs and St. Albert led the way, with St. Albert benefiting from this year's upgrade of the facade. In Poland, we're nearing the end of a challenging period marked by license delays and relocations. The main headwind this quarter was the closure of our Warsaw Hilton Casino, which contributed an EBITDA of $1.3 million last year versus a negative $0.5 million this quarter. Our relocated WrocÅ‚aw Casino is ramping up well, and the second WrocÅ‚aw location will open in January 2026, further strengthening our position there. All current licenses, as said before, are valid through 2028, so we expect stable operations going forward. With that, back to you, Peter. Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:10:52Thank you. Before we cover a few balance sheet and capital items, let me explain what led to the filing delay of a couple of days. As described in the 8-K we filed with the SEC yesterday, we discovered an error during impairment testing for goodwill at Rocky Gap that required us to restate our 2024 10-K and the 10-Qs for the first two quarters of this year. The correction of the error will reduce our goodwill balance with an offsetting increase in net loss less the tax impact. The estimated impacts are described in the 8-K. This does not change our revenue or Adjusted EBITDA for any of the periods being restated. We are finalizing our review of the amended financial statements and anticipate filing these with the SEC within the next five business days. All right, now back to the balance sheet. Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:11:46Our cash and cash equivalents at the end of the quarter were $78 million compared to $85 million at the end of Q2. That includes $5 million we spent in CapEx and $1.5 million we spent on the share buyback program. We also paid the annual table games license fee of $2.5 million in West Virginia, as well as about $1 million in closing costs in Poland. All in, we were about flat in cash from operations. The total principal amount of debt outstanding was $339 million, resulting in net debt of $261 million. At the end of the quarter, our net debt-to-EBITDA ratio was 6.9x. On a lease-adjusted basis, the ratio was 7.6x. Let me also note here that we have no debt maturities until 2029, and there is no need for significant CapEx this year or next. Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:12:48This year, we'll spend a total of $18 million, of which we have spent $15 million already. As we look ahead, we are very confident in our business prospects. Last year was a transitory period for us, but now we see a clear path forward to higher EBITDA and cash flow for 2026 and beyond. Now it's all about harvesting what we have invested last year. When you saw through the noise I mentioned at the beginning of the call, we are encouraged by the trends in our business. While we recognize the level of economic uncertainty, we are more confident in the long-term prospects of our company than we were at any point last year. While the fourth quarter has just started, it's worth noting that the positive customer trends have continued into October, including improved play from both core and retail customers. Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:13:44Preliminary results for October show EBITDA up well over 20% compared to last year. As we head into next year's tax season, we believe that our core customers around the country will benefit from the tax bill passed by Congress this summer, including new deductions for tips and overtime, and an additional deduction for seniors, as well as a larger standard deduction for all taxpayers. As you know, we are in the midst of a comprehensive strategic review process. At this stage, no decisions have been made, and there can be no assurance that the review will result in any transactions or particular change. We do not intend to make further public comments on the process unless and until the company's board of directors approves a specific course of action, which we do not expect before Q1 of next year. Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:14:40With that, I ask for your understanding that we will not take questions on this topic in our Q&A session, as we cannot share any incremental information at this time. All right, that concludes our prepared remarks. We'll now open the call for Q&A with the analysts. Operator, go ahead, please. Operator00:14:59Thank you. At this time, we will open the question-and-answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star and one on your telephone keypad, and you'll be placed into the queue in the order received. You may remove yourself from the queue at any time by pressing pound and one. If we do not get to your question, please reach out to the company using the Investor Relations page at cnty.com. Once again, to ask a question, press star one now. Our first question will come from Jeff Stantial with Stifel. Aidan YoungsEquity Research Analyst at Stifel00:15:35Good morning. This is Aidan Youngs on for Jeff Stantial. Thanks for taking our question. Maybe starting off on the strong results in your Canada portfolio, can you sort of expand a bit on what's driving that broad-based growth? As you continue to evaluate the broader portfolio, do you view these as more non-core with the increasing U.S. exposure, or do you see real synergies with the broader portfolio? Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:15:58Thank you, Jeff. I think I'll take that question starting the other way around. With regard to your second question, we see a little bit of synergy, but it's more incremental. It is probably to be seen as a standalone conglomerate of operations for the four Canadian properties that we have. Concerning the drivers, the one visible driver is St. Albert, where we redid the facade outside completely, and that had a really good impact. The rest of it is just, I think, very motivated management that's really continuing to sharpen the pencil, looks on the cost side, looks on the revenue side. We have recently been up there. We have a very motivated crew that is really eager to perform well. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:16:54It's good to see, and I think we have some more upside also given the macroeconomic situation in Canada, which seems by far less impacted or has been impacted than in the United States. Aidan YoungsEquity Research Analyst at Stifel00:17:12Great. That's helpful. Thank you for that. Turning to the Nugget, can you give us an idea of how you're thinking about timing for the group and convention business to normalize? To sort of put some numbers around it, how many more room nights can this add? On some of the new entertainment programming, can you help us think about how you're underwriting that uplift and how confident you are that this will attract those visits and corresponding gaming revenues that you're underwriting? That's all from us. Thank you. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:17:39Okay. So you're asking about the timing of the improvements as we see it, the impact it will have on room nights and the impact and the progress of the concerts, correct? Aidan YoungsEquity Research Analyst at Stifel00:17:53Yes. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:17:55Yeah. Okay. With regard to the timing, it's hard to say, but as I mentioned earlier, and Peter mentioned as well, we already see in October that a number of the things that we've been fine-tuning on the marketing side is starting to take effect. We are confident that we should see the full impact of what we are continuing to refine in, I mean, already now, but certainly going into 2026 as well. We're looking on the one hand on the revenue side of the casino, but combined, but also independent from that, we're also focusing on the retail side of the hotel business as a separate exercise because there continue to be there's a market segment that comes to the Nugget just to stay in the hotel, and there may or may not be gambling at all. It's not necessarily connected. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:18:54In that same context, also as mentioned earlier, we have decided that we continue to focus more and more intensely on the F&B side, possibly expand the offer, but certainly also continue to work on upgrading at least one or two of our outlets. It is hard to quantify with regard to room nights, but let us put it like that. We will have three statements for the hotel. The one is the casino side, which is mainly comped, and that is intertwined with what we do with our overall comping program and how much we give back to our customers. The second one is the convention and group business. We said earlier that smaller groups we can do short-term, but the larger groups have quite a long lead time. We are now talking about as far as 2030, 2031 with some of the larger groups. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:20:03As it looks now, we think that the group business in 2026 will be either the same or better than in 2025. The third one is the retail business, which we market also separately, and we have seen an increase in the retail segment already in 2025, and we believe that more can be done in 2026. Concerning the concerts, we have learned that to give you numbers, last year in 2024, the concerts standalone made a profit of around $850,000. This year, the concerts are making a loss of about $300,000. The reason for that is twofold. First of all, we just could not book what we wanted to book. It is not so easy. It depends when you target an act. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:20:57It depends on what their route is and whether they are in that part of the United States where you can book them at the price that one would be willing to pay. Oftentimes, it is not even a price question. They are just not there. Obviously, I am not willing to travel east-west without intelligent planning. We have not been very successful and lucky in that respect. The second thing is that led to the result that we could not get as many country acts as we wanted to. In 2026, we think that will be better. The second thing that we have learned is that we thought in order to reduce the risk, which is quite high in the concerts when you cannot sell the tickets, we would rather book acts that cost a little bit less than, for example, a Rod Stewart or so. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:21:49That probably was not a good decision. We are now turning back into trying to book maybe fewer acts, but very good acts like Brooks & Dunn. With that, we think we can fix the concert side. We see that our goal is that the concerts stand on their own, but from at least half of the concerts, we see a very positive overflow into the hotel, casino, and F&B business. Aidan YoungsEquity Research Analyst at Stifel00:22:26That's great. Thank you. I'll pass it on. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:22:29Thank you. Operator00:22:31Our next question today will come from Jordan Bender with Citizens. Jordan BenderSenior Equity Research Analyst at Citizens Bank00:22:36Hi everyone. Good to hear from you. It sounds like you're seeing some pretty good success from the ETGs that you've put in Colorado. Do you think this strategy is a strategy you would look to implement across any of your other U.S. assets, just given the cost side helps margins at the end of the day? Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:22:58Yes. However, not necessarily by completely replacing table games with ETGs. We do have ETGs in other casinos where, parallel to those, we still keep the nice game. In Colorado, it was just a question of the—it was just so obvious that it's the better small operations. It was not worth keeping the few tables. In the larger casinos, we do have ETGs on the one hand and table games on the other hand. As we see it now, we keep that also. Jordan BenderSenior Equity Research Analyst at Citizens Bank00:23:33Great. Thank you. On the follow-up, I think you mentioned you bought shares back in the quarter. I'm just curious where your balance sheet sits today, where the cash balance sits. How do you kind of think about buying back shares here versus continuing to pay down debt as we head into 2026? Thank you. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:23:53Absolutely. Peggy, why don't you take that question, please? Peggy StapletonCFO at Century Casinos00:24:00We're currently analyzing the stock buyback versus paying back debt and have not made any real decisions on how to proceed into 2026. Jordan BenderSenior Equity Research Analyst at Citizens Bank00:24:13Okay. Thank you very much. Operator00:24:19We will take our next question from Ryan Sigdahl with Craig-Hallum Group. Please go ahead. Ryan SigdahlSenior Research Analyst at Craig-Hallum00:24:26Hey, guys. 20% or greater than that, even with our growth in October, improved play from the core and retail players, if I caught that right in the prepared remarks. Can you elaborate, I guess, on specifically is that pretty broad-based across the portfolio? As you look to November and December, are there any weird comps or anything to be aware of on the plans for this year where that's not a good assumption to kind of continue throughout the rest of the quarter? Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:24:58We do not see anything unusual that would impact the one or the other way the first quarter. With regard to the customer trends that Peter mentioned that led to the 20%+ in October, we just hope that the consumer sentiment continues to improve because that has impacted us so negatively in the lower end of the database. Anybody's guess, but I think there is at least a hope that the consumer sentiment will improve during the next, hopefully, remaining two months of this year. Peter, would you like to add to that? Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:25:42Yeah. I think the one and only difference we'll see is that last year, in the first week of November, we did open the Caruthersville land-based, the new land-based facility. In the year-over-year comparison, that one property from the first week of November on will probably not have the same growth rates that we have seen over the last 12 months. With all other properties, I don't see any abnormalities. Ryan SigdahlSenior Research Analyst at Craig-Hallum00:26:19Great. Just on the Nugget, July, September were weaker. Curious, I guess, thinking going back a year or two, it was the convention business was building. It was going to really be inflecting kind of middle to late this year into 2026. I guess, is there a reason? Did you have any cancellations? Or curious, I guess, the weakness in July and September, as my view, I guess, could have been partially incorrect, but was that the convention business was going to really start to ramp up here? Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:26:56Yeah. The weakness in September mainly came from the fact that we, as mentioned earlier, also that in 2024, we had two powerful, very good concerts. One of them was Chase and Eldion. In September, we did not have any. Also in September, we had what is called a bingo blow, a large bingo event in September, which we did not have this September. With regard to the conference business, there was also less conference business in July and September of 2025 as compared to 2024. That could not be changed in the short term. Jordan BenderSenior Equity Research Analyst at Citizens Bank00:27:37Thanks. Good luck, guys. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:27:39Thank you. Operator00:27:41We will move next to Chad Beynon with Macquarie Group. Chad BeynonManaging Director and Senior Analyst at Macquarie Group00:27:47Good morning. Thanks for taking my question. Wanted to ask about Caruthersville. You touched on the growth that you continue to see in the operating leverage of that property. Are you still on track to hit the returns that you originally laid out on the construction CapEx? And then secondarily, where do you expect most of the growth to come from? Will it be that further out customer in the neighboring states, or are there still opportunities in the closer-in catchment area? Thank you. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:28:25Yes. First question, yes. We are on track with regard to what we expected. Secondly, we think that growth will come both from the geographically closer and the further away group of people with more potential in the 75+ mi. We think that we can reach out even more into that segment than we did so far. More growth from the more distant areas, but still growth from the closer areas as well. Jordan BenderSenior Equity Research Analyst at Citizens Bank00:29:00Okay. Great. Then going back to the weakness that you saw in the retail customer, which it appears based on the 20% growth in October, that's abated. Do you know why this is? Is there any evidence in terms of that this will remain stable? Anything else to point to in terms of why it fell off during the period? Could it have been weather-related, comparable-related, local CPI or unemployment? Just any evidence that'll give us confidence that retail could improve here in Q4 and beyond? Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:29:50Yeah. It's hard to say, but we believe that it has to do with the insecurity around tariffs and the impacts that tariffs may possibly have to the consumers. That is a worry that typically is more prevalent in the lower end of the database. We see that also in places like Rocky Gap, for example, where the household income of the catchment area is significantly lower than in other markets that we're active in. That certainly has a strong effect. I'm not as good as others to speculate about the increasing consumer sentiment going forward. If we had to say something, we would think there is a friendly outlook. You probably could make a better judgment on that. Jordan BenderSenior Equity Research Analyst at Citizens Bank00:30:42Great. Are there initiatives or cost improvements that you could make if this customer remains volatile? Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:30:54There's always a possibility to look for more and tighten the belt further. I think if it's not, I don't think that it will get any worse than it was in the first months of this year. We've maneuvered through them well. I think if necessary, we could do that again. There is always, as I said, if you keep looking, then there's always a way to save more. The danger always is that you don't go too far in what you're doing. Jordan BenderSenior Equity Research Analyst at Citizens Bank00:31:26Great. Thank you very much. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:31:29Thank you. Operator00:31:31Our next question comes from Connor Parks with CBRE. Connor ParksSenior Analyst at CBRE00:31:36Hey, everyone. Thanks for taking my questions. Maybe another capital allocation one, maybe separate from the debt paid down versus share repo discussion. Just in the context of the cash on the balance sheet and some of the EBITDA growth you've seen this year with all the CapEx rolling off in Missouri, I guess, how are you weighing the reinvestment plan at this point? Is there anything maybe outside of Nugget you mentioned that you would like to build or reinvest in or any low-hanging fruit type projects in Missouri again that you're weighing at this point in time? Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:32:11Yeah. Let me start out and then hand over to Peter and Peggy. We were thinking about doing a little bit of a facade upgrade also in two of the Canadian properties. That is not a large CapEx item, but it is some CapEx. As I said earlier, in St. Albert, it was very beneficial for the revenues and for the business there. We may spend a little bit of money in connection with food and beverage at the Nugget. That would be probably it apart from the routine upkeep and investment into mainly stock products of our properties. Peter, can I hand over to you? Maybe you would continue or want to expand on that some more? Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:33:04Yeah, sure. Listen, Connor, we do not expect any significant or large moves, not on the stock buyback front and also not on the paydown of the debt currently because, as you know, we are in the midst of the strategic review process. It will depend on the outcome of that. We could sell something, then we would have significant amounts of money to pay down the debt. We could do some other transaction that is still up in the air. Until we have concluded that process, you will not see any significant either stock buybacks or paydown of debt. Connor ParksSenior Analyst at CBRE00:34:02Great. Thank you. Maybe as my follow-up, you've mentioned in this quarter and prior quarters the expected uplift potential in regional gaming around the benefits from the upcoming tax season. I guess, have you provided any barriers or tried to quantify any of these benefits around customer bases, spending habits, or anything of that matter for any of the areas of which you operate in? Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:34:34I wouldn't dare to make a guess here. It's hard to say. Peter, Peggy, do you think you could quantify? Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:34:45No, not really. See, as Erwin said before, mostly the low ADT players, the lower segments of our database are impacted by that. Depending on which property, it's about maybe 15%-20%, 25% of our customers are in the lower segment. In general, we are making steps to move away from that and to move towards mid-tier and upper-tier customers in our marketing approach and in everything we are doing. That should lessen that impact. I agree, we don't want to quantify that. Not enough hard facts available. Connor ParksSenior Analyst at CBRE00:35:38Awesome. Thank you. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:35:39Thanks, Connor. Operator00:35:43That is all the time we have. If we did not get to your question, please reach out to the company using the Investor Relations page at cnyt.com. I will now turn the call back to Mr. Hoetzinger for closing remarks. Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:35:58Yeah. Thanks, operator. Thanks, everybody. We appreciate you joining our call today. We'll talk again when we present the 2025 full year results. Until then, thank you and goodbye. Operator00:36:13This does conclude today's conference. Thank you for attending.Read moreParticipantsExecutivesPeter HoetzingerCo-CEOErwin HaitzmannCo-CEOPeggy StapletonCFOAnalystsAidan YoungsEquity Research Analyst at StifelJordan BenderSenior Equity Research Analyst at Citizens BankConnor ParksSenior Analyst at CBREChad BeynonManaging Director and Senior Analyst at Macquarie GroupRyan SigdahlSenior Research Analyst at Craig-HallumPowered by Earnings DocumentsSlide DeckEarnings Release(8-K)Quarterly Report(10-Q) Century Casinos Earnings HeadlinesCentury Casinos, Inc. Q2 2026 Earnings Call SummaryAugust 8, 2026 | finance.yahoo.comCentury Casinos targets net debt-to-EBITDA well below 6x by year-end as 2026 CapEx is set at $15MAugust 7, 2026 | seekingalpha.comThey're shrinking your dollars every single monthSince 2020, the dollar has lost roughly a quarter of its buying power. A $500,000 nest egg today buys about what $375,000 did five years ago, even though no statement shows the change. Central banks have bought over 1,000 tonnes of gold a year for three straight years, using the same published data now explained in a free guide. The guide breaks down what's driving the shift in plain English, so readers can see the numbers for themselves.September 24 at 1:00 AM | American Alternative (Ad)Century Casinos, Inc. (CNTY) Q2 2026 Earnings Call TranscriptAugust 7, 2026 | seekingalpha.comCentury Casinos shares rise despite second-quarter earnings missAugust 7, 2026 | msn.comCentury Casinos, Inc. Announces Second Quarter 2026 ResultsAugust 7, 2026 | prnewswire.comSee More Century Casinos Headlines Get Earnings Announcements in your inboxWant to stay updated on the latest earnings announcements and upcoming reports for companies like Century Casinos? Sign up for Earnings360's daily newsletter to receive timely earnings updates on Century Casinos and other key companies, straight to your email. Email Address About Century CasinosCentury Casinos (NASDAQ:CNTY) is a gaming and entertainment company that develops, owns, operates and manages casinos, racetracks and related hospitality properties. Its facilities typically offer casino gaming, including slot machines and table games, along with restaurants, bars, hotels and other entertainment amenities. The company operates properties in the United States and Canada. Its U.S. portfolio has included casinos and gaming resorts in Colorado, Missouri and West Virginia, while its Canadian operations have included casino and racetrack properties in Alberta. Century Casinos has also pursued gaming-management and development opportunities in other regulated international markets. Century Casinos was founded in 1992 by Erwin Haitzmann and Peter Hoetzinger, who have served as the company’s principal leaders and co-chief executive officers. The company is headquartered in Colorado Springs, Colorado, and its shares trade on the Nasdaq under the symbol CNTY.View Century Casinos ProfileRead more More Earnings Resources from MarketBeat Earnings Tools Today's Earnings Tomorrow's Earnings Next Week's Earnings Upcoming Earnings Calls Earnings Newsletter Earnings Call Transcripts Earnings Beats & Misses Corporate Guidance Earnings Screener Latest Articles Hims & Hers Slides Nearly 7% as Legal Pressure Adds to Its Growing List of Risks3 Restaurant Stocks Near 52-Week Lows as Consumer Pressure BuildsPaychex Plunges, Providing the Entry Investors Have Been Waiting ForThe Case for Buying High-Yield General Mills Just StrengthenedEnergy Transfer Taps the AI Power BoomFull Throttle: Kratos and GE Fire Up a Next-Gen Defense EngineSandisk Joins the S&P 100—Is the Index Flow, or the AI Story, Driving the Stock? Upcoming Earnings Micron Technology (9/30/2026)NIKE (10/1/2026)Accenture (10/1/2026)PepsiCo (10/8/2026)Delta Air Lines (10/9/2026)America Movil (10/13/2026)BlackRock (10/13/2026)Citigroup (10/13/2026)The Goldman Sachs Group (10/13/2026)JPMorgan Chase & Co. (10/13/2026) Unlock superior investment research and tools. Sign up for MarketBeat All Access to gain access to MarketBeat's full suite of research tools and reports. Get MarketBeat All Access MarketBeat All Access Features Best-in-Class Portfolio Monitoring Get personalized stock ideas. Compare portfolio to indices. Check stock news, ratings, SEC filings, and more. Stock Ideas and Recommendations See daily stock ideas from top analysts. Receive short-term trading ideas from MarketBeat. Identify trending stocks on social media. Advanced Stock Screeners and Research Tools Use our seven stock screeners to find suitable stocks. Stay informed with MarketBeat's real-time news. Export data to Excel for personal analysis. Sign in to your free account to enjoy these benefits In-depth profiles and analysis for 20,000 public companies. Real-time analyst ratings, insider transactions, earnings data, and more. Our daily ratings and market update email newsletter. Sign in to your free account to enjoy all that MarketBeat has to offer. Sign In Create Account Your Email Address: Email Address Required Your Password: Password Required Log In Email Me a Login Link or Sign in with Facebook Sign in with Google Forgot your password? Your Email Address: Please enter your email address. Please enter a valid email address Choose a Password: Please enter your password. Your password must be at least 8 characters long and contain at least 1 number, 1 letter, and 1 special character. Create My Account (Free) or Sign in with Facebook Sign in with Google By creating a free account, you agree to our terms of service. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
PresentationSkip to Participants Operator00:00:00Good day, everyone, and welcome to today's Century Casinos Q3 2025 earnings call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Later, you'll have the opportunity to ask questions during the question-and-answer session. You may register to ask a question at any time by pressing the star and one on your telephone keypad. Please note this call is being recorded, and I will be standing by if you should need any assistance. It is now my pleasure to turn the conference over to Peter Hoetzinger. Please go ahead. Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:00:33Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining our earnings call. We would like to remind everyone that we will be discussing forward-looking information under the Sfe Harbor provisions of the U.S. federal securities laws. The company undertakes no obligation to update or revise the forward-looking statements, and actual results may differ from those projected. Throughout our call, we refer to several non-GAAP financial measures, including, but not limited to, Adjusted EBITDA. Reconciliations of our non-GAAP measures to the appropriate GAAP measures can be found in our news releases and SEC filings available in the investor section of our website at cny.com. With me today are my Co-CEO, Erwin Haitzmann, and our Chief Financial Officer, Margaret Stapleton. After our prepared remarks, we'll open the call for questions from analysts. We announced solid third-quarter results yesterday afternoon. Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:01:35Net operating revenue was $154 million, driven by strength in the East and Midwest regions, as well as in Canada, offset by weakness in the West region and in Poland. The quarter started out really well. EBITDA in July was up 7%. August was even better, with EBITDA up 22%. September saw a sharp year-over-year decline due to the following one-time effects. In September of last year, Colorado received a $1 million breakup fee from Tipico. Also in September of last year, Mountaineer had a bonus accrual for $500,000 reversed. This September, Poland had extra costs but no revenue from a closed casino. As such, you can attribute the EBITDA decline in Q3 all to Poland and the one-time effects in September I just mentioned. Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:02:38Adjusting for those, Q3 EBITDA would have increased by about 5%, beating consensus estimates and demonstrating the continued operating momentum across various segments of our business. Not bad at all, definitely better than it looks at first sight. During the third quarter, the play from our high-value and core customers continued its long-term growth trend, but we did not see further improvements from our low-end customers. The upper customer segments continued to perform well, showing 8% growth, helping to offset a 9% decline in the lower-end segments. Therefore, total rated GGR was essentially flat. Retail play increased by 4%, resulting in a 2% GGR increase across the U.S. portfolio. Visitation statistics show a similar picture. Visits by high-value and core customers increased 4%, while visits from low-segment players declined. Before I hand it over to Erwin, let me come back to Poland for a second. Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:03:51From now on, no license expirations are coming up for at least three years, so Poland should be at its normalized EBITDA run rate for many quarters to come. In any case, however, we remain committed to divesting our Poland operations and will provide updates on the divestment process in the coming months as appropriate. Now over to Erwin for more color on our individual properties and markets. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:04:18Thank you, Peter, and good morning, everyone. Let me start with our results for the third quarter beginning in Missouri. Our Century Casino & Hotel Caruthersville which just celebrated its first anniversary, continues to exceed expectations. Gaming revenue grew strongly across all segments: high-value up 82%, core up 29%, and retail up 22%. In total, gaming revenue was 29% higher than last year, and EBITDA increased 35% to $6.1 million, up from $4.5 million. Rent expense rose about $1.1 million, reflecting the VG lease that funded the new property, and operating margins remain high. It is worth noting that with our new land-based facilities, we're now reaching new markets. This is particularly evident in the significant increase in customers leaving 75+ mi from Caruthersville. Caruthersville has been an outstanding success, modern, efficient, and exceptionally well-received by our guests. Our thanks to the entire team for a fantastic first year. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:05:34Now to Century Casinos & Hotel Cape Girardeau. Cape delivered $6.1 million in EBITDA, only slightly below last year's record quarter. The property continues to perform very well against competition from Illinois. Sports betting launches in Missouri on December 1, and in partnership with BetMGM, we will open a BetMGM-branded sportsbook on property, and BetMGM will launch its online sportsbook using our skin. We expect sports betting to elevate Cape's profile and create new revenue streams for the property. Now moving to Colorado. At Cripple Creek, EBITDA was $1.8 million, flat year-over-year. In the quarter, our high-value and core segments grew, while base and retail declined. Retail play now represents about 30% of total gaming revenue. We believe that Chamonix may capture a larger share of the retail market, still driven by the novelty effect. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:06:41At Century City, rated play was up 6%, but total revenue was down 4%, again due to fewer retail players. EBITDA came in at $1.2 million, up 20% on a comparable basis, as last year's EBITDA of $2 million included a $1 million one-time payment from Tipico. At both Colorado properties, we have replaced live table games with electronic table lounges, which generate about the same revenue at significantly lower cost. That's a solid win for both operations. Now to the East. At Mountaineer in West Virginia, EBITDA was $4.4 million, flat to last year. Apples to apples, though, EBITDA was up $500,000, as last year's EBITDA was inflated by the reversal of a $500,000 bonus accrual. Performance across the board was steady, and parimutuel handle rose 26%, driven by improved scheduling and race mix. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:07:49At Rocky Gap in Maryland, EBITDA increased 7% to $4.9 million, as we expected our first team quarter without weather disruptions since the beginning of the year. Growth came from high-value players, while other segments held steady. Now to the West and the Nugget Casino Resort in Reno-Sparks. While the Nugget had a standout August, mainly due to our signature Best-in-the-West Nugget Rib Cook-off, overall, the quarter was still challenging. We experienced a record EBITDA for August of $4.1 million, the highest single-month result in nearly three years, but that was offset by weaker July and September. Throughout the quarter, we enhanced marketing programs to grow both local and destination play. We're also building out our 2026 concert season. Tickets for Brooks & Dunn in April are already selling extremely well. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:08:51We began converting unused space into an additional 11,000 sq ft of convention space, a 10% increase in square footage to be completed by year-end. The additional space will first be used by a major group event that is booked for January 2026. At the Nugget, we're executing on a clear repositioning strategy, shifting away from low-ADD players who are no longer profitable and focusing on core players in Reno-Sparks and Northern California. In sync with the enhanced marketing to players in the core segment, we're working on further improving the F&B offerings. It takes time, but we're starting to see the results already. Now to Canada and Europe. In Alberta, slot coining was up 5.8%, total revenue up 1.6%, and EBITDA up 11.1% to $5.4 million. Growth was broad-based, supported by disciplined cost management. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:09:59Century Downs and St. Albert led the way, with St. Albert benefiting from this year's upgrade of the facade. In Poland, we're nearing the end of a challenging period marked by license delays and relocations. The main headwind this quarter was the closure of our Warsaw Hilton Casino, which contributed an EBITDA of $1.3 million last year versus a negative $0.5 million this quarter. Our relocated Wrocław Casino is ramping up well, and the second Wrocław location will open in January 2026, further strengthening our position there. All current licenses, as said before, are valid through 2028, so we expect stable operations going forward. With that, back to you, Peter. Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:10:52Thank you. Before we cover a few balance sheet and capital items, let me explain what led to the filing delay of a couple of days. As described in the 8-K we filed with the SEC yesterday, we discovered an error during impairment testing for goodwill at Rocky Gap that required us to restate our 2024 10-K and the 10-Qs for the first two quarters of this year. The correction of the error will reduce our goodwill balance with an offsetting increase in net loss less the tax impact. The estimated impacts are described in the 8-K. This does not change our revenue or Adjusted EBITDA for any of the periods being restated. We are finalizing our review of the amended financial statements and anticipate filing these with the SEC within the next five business days. All right, now back to the balance sheet. Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:11:46Our cash and cash equivalents at the end of the quarter were $78 million compared to $85 million at the end of Q2. That includes $5 million we spent in CapEx and $1.5 million we spent on the share buyback program. We also paid the annual table games license fee of $2.5 million in West Virginia, as well as about $1 million in closing costs in Poland. All in, we were about flat in cash from operations. The total principal amount of debt outstanding was $339 million, resulting in net debt of $261 million. At the end of the quarter, our net debt-to-EBITDA ratio was 6.9x. On a lease-adjusted basis, the ratio was 7.6x. Let me also note here that we have no debt maturities until 2029, and there is no need for significant CapEx this year or next. Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:12:48This year, we'll spend a total of $18 million, of which we have spent $15 million already. As we look ahead, we are very confident in our business prospects. Last year was a transitory period for us, but now we see a clear path forward to higher EBITDA and cash flow for 2026 and beyond. Now it's all about harvesting what we have invested last year. When you saw through the noise I mentioned at the beginning of the call, we are encouraged by the trends in our business. While we recognize the level of economic uncertainty, we are more confident in the long-term prospects of our company than we were at any point last year. While the fourth quarter has just started, it's worth noting that the positive customer trends have continued into October, including improved play from both core and retail customers. Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:13:44Preliminary results for October show EBITDA up well over 20% compared to last year. As we head into next year's tax season, we believe that our core customers around the country will benefit from the tax bill passed by Congress this summer, including new deductions for tips and overtime, and an additional deduction for seniors, as well as a larger standard deduction for all taxpayers. As you know, we are in the midst of a comprehensive strategic review process. At this stage, no decisions have been made, and there can be no assurance that the review will result in any transactions or particular change. We do not intend to make further public comments on the process unless and until the company's board of directors approves a specific course of action, which we do not expect before Q1 of next year. Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:14:40With that, I ask for your understanding that we will not take questions on this topic in our Q&A session, as we cannot share any incremental information at this time. All right, that concludes our prepared remarks. We'll now open the call for Q&A with the analysts. Operator, go ahead, please. Operator00:14:59Thank you. At this time, we will open the question-and-answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star and one on your telephone keypad, and you'll be placed into the queue in the order received. You may remove yourself from the queue at any time by pressing pound and one. If we do not get to your question, please reach out to the company using the Investor Relations page at cnty.com. Once again, to ask a question, press star one now. Our first question will come from Jeff Stantial with Stifel. Aidan YoungsEquity Research Analyst at Stifel00:15:35Good morning. This is Aidan Youngs on for Jeff Stantial. Thanks for taking our question. Maybe starting off on the strong results in your Canada portfolio, can you sort of expand a bit on what's driving that broad-based growth? As you continue to evaluate the broader portfolio, do you view these as more non-core with the increasing U.S. exposure, or do you see real synergies with the broader portfolio? Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:15:58Thank you, Jeff. I think I'll take that question starting the other way around. With regard to your second question, we see a little bit of synergy, but it's more incremental. It is probably to be seen as a standalone conglomerate of operations for the four Canadian properties that we have. Concerning the drivers, the one visible driver is St. Albert, where we redid the facade outside completely, and that had a really good impact. The rest of it is just, I think, very motivated management that's really continuing to sharpen the pencil, looks on the cost side, looks on the revenue side. We have recently been up there. We have a very motivated crew that is really eager to perform well. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:16:54It's good to see, and I think we have some more upside also given the macroeconomic situation in Canada, which seems by far less impacted or has been impacted than in the United States. Aidan YoungsEquity Research Analyst at Stifel00:17:12Great. That's helpful. Thank you for that. Turning to the Nugget, can you give us an idea of how you're thinking about timing for the group and convention business to normalize? To sort of put some numbers around it, how many more room nights can this add? On some of the new entertainment programming, can you help us think about how you're underwriting that uplift and how confident you are that this will attract those visits and corresponding gaming revenues that you're underwriting? That's all from us. Thank you. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:17:39Okay. So you're asking about the timing of the improvements as we see it, the impact it will have on room nights and the impact and the progress of the concerts, correct? Aidan YoungsEquity Research Analyst at Stifel00:17:53Yes. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:17:55Yeah. Okay. With regard to the timing, it's hard to say, but as I mentioned earlier, and Peter mentioned as well, we already see in October that a number of the things that we've been fine-tuning on the marketing side is starting to take effect. We are confident that we should see the full impact of what we are continuing to refine in, I mean, already now, but certainly going into 2026 as well. We're looking on the one hand on the revenue side of the casino, but combined, but also independent from that, we're also focusing on the retail side of the hotel business as a separate exercise because there continue to be there's a market segment that comes to the Nugget just to stay in the hotel, and there may or may not be gambling at all. It's not necessarily connected. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:18:54In that same context, also as mentioned earlier, we have decided that we continue to focus more and more intensely on the F&B side, possibly expand the offer, but certainly also continue to work on upgrading at least one or two of our outlets. It is hard to quantify with regard to room nights, but let us put it like that. We will have three statements for the hotel. The one is the casino side, which is mainly comped, and that is intertwined with what we do with our overall comping program and how much we give back to our customers. The second one is the convention and group business. We said earlier that smaller groups we can do short-term, but the larger groups have quite a long lead time. We are now talking about as far as 2030, 2031 with some of the larger groups. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:20:03As it looks now, we think that the group business in 2026 will be either the same or better than in 2025. The third one is the retail business, which we market also separately, and we have seen an increase in the retail segment already in 2025, and we believe that more can be done in 2026. Concerning the concerts, we have learned that to give you numbers, last year in 2024, the concerts standalone made a profit of around $850,000. This year, the concerts are making a loss of about $300,000. The reason for that is twofold. First of all, we just could not book what we wanted to book. It is not so easy. It depends when you target an act. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:20:57It depends on what their route is and whether they are in that part of the United States where you can book them at the price that one would be willing to pay. Oftentimes, it is not even a price question. They are just not there. Obviously, I am not willing to travel east-west without intelligent planning. We have not been very successful and lucky in that respect. The second thing is that led to the result that we could not get as many country acts as we wanted to. In 2026, we think that will be better. The second thing that we have learned is that we thought in order to reduce the risk, which is quite high in the concerts when you cannot sell the tickets, we would rather book acts that cost a little bit less than, for example, a Rod Stewart or so. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:21:49That probably was not a good decision. We are now turning back into trying to book maybe fewer acts, but very good acts like Brooks & Dunn. With that, we think we can fix the concert side. We see that our goal is that the concerts stand on their own, but from at least half of the concerts, we see a very positive overflow into the hotel, casino, and F&B business. Aidan YoungsEquity Research Analyst at Stifel00:22:26That's great. Thank you. I'll pass it on. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:22:29Thank you. Operator00:22:31Our next question today will come from Jordan Bender with Citizens. Jordan BenderSenior Equity Research Analyst at Citizens Bank00:22:36Hi everyone. Good to hear from you. It sounds like you're seeing some pretty good success from the ETGs that you've put in Colorado. Do you think this strategy is a strategy you would look to implement across any of your other U.S. assets, just given the cost side helps margins at the end of the day? Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:22:58Yes. However, not necessarily by completely replacing table games with ETGs. We do have ETGs in other casinos where, parallel to those, we still keep the nice game. In Colorado, it was just a question of the—it was just so obvious that it's the better small operations. It was not worth keeping the few tables. In the larger casinos, we do have ETGs on the one hand and table games on the other hand. As we see it now, we keep that also. Jordan BenderSenior Equity Research Analyst at Citizens Bank00:23:33Great. Thank you. On the follow-up, I think you mentioned you bought shares back in the quarter. I'm just curious where your balance sheet sits today, where the cash balance sits. How do you kind of think about buying back shares here versus continuing to pay down debt as we head into 2026? Thank you. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:23:53Absolutely. Peggy, why don't you take that question, please? Peggy StapletonCFO at Century Casinos00:24:00We're currently analyzing the stock buyback versus paying back debt and have not made any real decisions on how to proceed into 2026. Jordan BenderSenior Equity Research Analyst at Citizens Bank00:24:13Okay. Thank you very much. Operator00:24:19We will take our next question from Ryan Sigdahl with Craig-Hallum Group. Please go ahead. Ryan SigdahlSenior Research Analyst at Craig-Hallum00:24:26Hey, guys. 20% or greater than that, even with our growth in October, improved play from the core and retail players, if I caught that right in the prepared remarks. Can you elaborate, I guess, on specifically is that pretty broad-based across the portfolio? As you look to November and December, are there any weird comps or anything to be aware of on the plans for this year where that's not a good assumption to kind of continue throughout the rest of the quarter? Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:24:58We do not see anything unusual that would impact the one or the other way the first quarter. With regard to the customer trends that Peter mentioned that led to the 20%+ in October, we just hope that the consumer sentiment continues to improve because that has impacted us so negatively in the lower end of the database. Anybody's guess, but I think there is at least a hope that the consumer sentiment will improve during the next, hopefully, remaining two months of this year. Peter, would you like to add to that? Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:25:42Yeah. I think the one and only difference we'll see is that last year, in the first week of November, we did open the Caruthersville land-based, the new land-based facility. In the year-over-year comparison, that one property from the first week of November on will probably not have the same growth rates that we have seen over the last 12 months. With all other properties, I don't see any abnormalities. Ryan SigdahlSenior Research Analyst at Craig-Hallum00:26:19Great. Just on the Nugget, July, September were weaker. Curious, I guess, thinking going back a year or two, it was the convention business was building. It was going to really be inflecting kind of middle to late this year into 2026. I guess, is there a reason? Did you have any cancellations? Or curious, I guess, the weakness in July and September, as my view, I guess, could have been partially incorrect, but was that the convention business was going to really start to ramp up here? Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:26:56Yeah. The weakness in September mainly came from the fact that we, as mentioned earlier, also that in 2024, we had two powerful, very good concerts. One of them was Chase and Eldion. In September, we did not have any. Also in September, we had what is called a bingo blow, a large bingo event in September, which we did not have this September. With regard to the conference business, there was also less conference business in July and September of 2025 as compared to 2024. That could not be changed in the short term. Jordan BenderSenior Equity Research Analyst at Citizens Bank00:27:37Thanks. Good luck, guys. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:27:39Thank you. Operator00:27:41We will move next to Chad Beynon with Macquarie Group. Chad BeynonManaging Director and Senior Analyst at Macquarie Group00:27:47Good morning. Thanks for taking my question. Wanted to ask about Caruthersville. You touched on the growth that you continue to see in the operating leverage of that property. Are you still on track to hit the returns that you originally laid out on the construction CapEx? And then secondarily, where do you expect most of the growth to come from? Will it be that further out customer in the neighboring states, or are there still opportunities in the closer-in catchment area? Thank you. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:28:25Yes. First question, yes. We are on track with regard to what we expected. Secondly, we think that growth will come both from the geographically closer and the further away group of people with more potential in the 75+ mi. We think that we can reach out even more into that segment than we did so far. More growth from the more distant areas, but still growth from the closer areas as well. Jordan BenderSenior Equity Research Analyst at Citizens Bank00:29:00Okay. Great. Then going back to the weakness that you saw in the retail customer, which it appears based on the 20% growth in October, that's abated. Do you know why this is? Is there any evidence in terms of that this will remain stable? Anything else to point to in terms of why it fell off during the period? Could it have been weather-related, comparable-related, local CPI or unemployment? Just any evidence that'll give us confidence that retail could improve here in Q4 and beyond? Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:29:50Yeah. It's hard to say, but we believe that it has to do with the insecurity around tariffs and the impacts that tariffs may possibly have to the consumers. That is a worry that typically is more prevalent in the lower end of the database. We see that also in places like Rocky Gap, for example, where the household income of the catchment area is significantly lower than in other markets that we're active in. That certainly has a strong effect. I'm not as good as others to speculate about the increasing consumer sentiment going forward. If we had to say something, we would think there is a friendly outlook. You probably could make a better judgment on that. Jordan BenderSenior Equity Research Analyst at Citizens Bank00:30:42Great. Are there initiatives or cost improvements that you could make if this customer remains volatile? Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:30:54There's always a possibility to look for more and tighten the belt further. I think if it's not, I don't think that it will get any worse than it was in the first months of this year. We've maneuvered through them well. I think if necessary, we could do that again. There is always, as I said, if you keep looking, then there's always a way to save more. The danger always is that you don't go too far in what you're doing. Jordan BenderSenior Equity Research Analyst at Citizens Bank00:31:26Great. Thank you very much. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:31:29Thank you. Operator00:31:31Our next question comes from Connor Parks with CBRE. Connor ParksSenior Analyst at CBRE00:31:36Hey, everyone. Thanks for taking my questions. Maybe another capital allocation one, maybe separate from the debt paid down versus share repo discussion. Just in the context of the cash on the balance sheet and some of the EBITDA growth you've seen this year with all the CapEx rolling off in Missouri, I guess, how are you weighing the reinvestment plan at this point? Is there anything maybe outside of Nugget you mentioned that you would like to build or reinvest in or any low-hanging fruit type projects in Missouri again that you're weighing at this point in time? Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:32:11Yeah. Let me start out and then hand over to Peter and Peggy. We were thinking about doing a little bit of a facade upgrade also in two of the Canadian properties. That is not a large CapEx item, but it is some CapEx. As I said earlier, in St. Albert, it was very beneficial for the revenues and for the business there. We may spend a little bit of money in connection with food and beverage at the Nugget. That would be probably it apart from the routine upkeep and investment into mainly stock products of our properties. Peter, can I hand over to you? Maybe you would continue or want to expand on that some more? Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:33:04Yeah, sure. Listen, Connor, we do not expect any significant or large moves, not on the stock buyback front and also not on the paydown of the debt currently because, as you know, we are in the midst of the strategic review process. It will depend on the outcome of that. We could sell something, then we would have significant amounts of money to pay down the debt. We could do some other transaction that is still up in the air. Until we have concluded that process, you will not see any significant either stock buybacks or paydown of debt. Connor ParksSenior Analyst at CBRE00:34:02Great. Thank you. Maybe as my follow-up, you've mentioned in this quarter and prior quarters the expected uplift potential in regional gaming around the benefits from the upcoming tax season. I guess, have you provided any barriers or tried to quantify any of these benefits around customer bases, spending habits, or anything of that matter for any of the areas of which you operate in? Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:34:34I wouldn't dare to make a guess here. It's hard to say. Peter, Peggy, do you think you could quantify? Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:34:45No, not really. See, as Erwin said before, mostly the low ADT players, the lower segments of our database are impacted by that. Depending on which property, it's about maybe 15%-20%, 25% of our customers are in the lower segment. In general, we are making steps to move away from that and to move towards mid-tier and upper-tier customers in our marketing approach and in everything we are doing. That should lessen that impact. I agree, we don't want to quantify that. Not enough hard facts available. Connor ParksSenior Analyst at CBRE00:35:38Awesome. Thank you. Erwin HaitzmannCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:35:39Thanks, Connor. Operator00:35:43That is all the time we have. If we did not get to your question, please reach out to the company using the Investor Relations page at cnyt.com. I will now turn the call back to Mr. Hoetzinger for closing remarks. Peter HoetzingerCo-CEO at Century Casinos00:35:58Yeah. Thanks, operator. Thanks, everybody. We appreciate you joining our call today. We'll talk again when we present the 2025 full year results. Until then, thank you and goodbye. Operator00:36:13This does conclude today's conference. Thank you for attending.Read moreParticipantsExecutivesPeter HoetzingerCo-CEOErwin HaitzmannCo-CEOPeggy StapletonCFOAnalystsAidan YoungsEquity Research Analyst at StifelJordan BenderSenior Equity Research Analyst at Citizens BankConnor ParksSenior Analyst at CBREChad BeynonManaging Director and Senior Analyst at Macquarie GroupRyan SigdahlSenior Research Analyst at Craig-HallumPowered by