Gaming | Wynn Resorts biggest shareholder T. Rowe cuts stake 40 pct

T. Rowe Price Group Inc., the largest stockholder in Wynn Resorts Ltd., cut its stake in the casino company by almost 40 percent, according to a filing Monday.
The mutual fund company now holds 10.4 million shares of Las Vegas-based Wynn Resorts, down from 17.1 million as of Dec. 31, according to filings and data compiled by Bloomberg.
T. Rowe is reducing its investment in Wynn Resorts amid a downturn in Macau, the world’s largest gambling market. The company is building a second resort there, the USD4.1 billion Wynn Palace scheduled to open in the first half of next year. It’s one of more than $20 billion of projects that casino operators plan to open in the Chinese betting enclave by 2017.
“We continue to have a positive, ongoing relationship” with T. Rowe Price, Michael Weaver, a Wynn Resorts spokesman, said in an e-mail.
Wynn Resorts fell 3.2 percent to $114.08 at the close in New York. The shares have declined 23 percent this year. The company reduced its dividend by two-thirds to 50 cents a share last month.
Betting in Macau, the only place in China where casino gambling is legal, has fallen as a government-led crackdown on corruption prompts wealthy Chinese to avoid conspicuous consumption. Total gambling revenue in the region, which accounted for 70 percent of Wynn Resorts’ sales in 2014, fell 39 percent in April, the 11th month of decline, according to Bloomberg Intelligence.
Katrina Clay, a spokeswoman for Baltimore-based T. Rowe Price, declined to comment. Christopher Palmeri, Bloomberg