State take from MGM $6.7m in September

STATE HOUSE NEWS SERVICE

THE FIRST FULL MONTH of gambling at a full-scale casino yielded more than $6.7 million in tax revenue for Massachusetts and almost $27 million in gross revenue for MGM Springfield, the Gaming Commission said Monday.

Players wagered $190 million on MGM Springfield’s slot machines in September and, while 90.45 percent of it was returned to players as winnings, MGM Springfield reported $18.15 million in gross slot revenue last month. The casino also counted $8.8 million in gross revenue from its table games in September for total monthly revenue of $26.95 million.

Full-scale casinos in Massachusetts are taxed at a rate of 25 percent of their gross gaming revenue and the monthly state tax haul from MGM in September was $6.74 million, the Gaming Commission said. MGM Springfield, which opened on Aug. 23, collected gaming revenue of roughly $9.46 million between its opening and the end of August.

Massachusetts collected another $7 million in tax revenue last month from the slots parlor at Plainridge Park Casino, where gamblers put $175.5 million on the line last month. The slots parlor in Plainville reported slots revenue of $14.32 million and a prize payout percentage of 91.84 last month, the commission said.

The state is entitled to more than $5.7 million of Plainridge’s September revenue in the form of state taxes intended for local aid and another $1.29 million for the Race Horse Development Fund. That works out to a total tax or assessment hit of just more than $7 million last month, according to the Gaming Commission.

Plainridge is taxed on 49 percent of its gross gaming revenue, with 82 percent of the levy going to local aid and 18 percent to a fund set up with the goal of supporting horse racing, an industry that is struggling in Massachusetts