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Since the creation of modern day Las Vegas, there have always been people lamenting the good ole days, whatever that means to that individual at the time. Determining what is considered “good” is about as subjective as subjective can be.  Most people today will point to the time before the strip was primarily owned by 2 companies, MGM Resorts and Caesars Entertainment.  While the benefits of consolidation are obvious, potentially the best thing about it is the story of how it all happened.  To do that, we are going to have to trace back to how these assets exchanged hands before finally ending up in the corporate portfolio that are currently a part of.  To keep the story clean and the timeline defined, we are only going to focus on the majority owners and only their moves in Las Vegas.  We’re calling this, the Great Consolidation of Las Vegas

Intensely private, Kerkorian’s legacy may not be as well known as Steve Wynn’s but is unarguably one of the most important in Vegas history.  Some will criticize MGM as the shinning example of the faceless corporate machine that has taken over the city but without the corporate evolution of the market, the expansion of gaming around the United States, and the world for that matter, would have never been possible.  Corporations removed the negative stigmatism the gambling industry had for eons and made it a viable, bordering on respectable business model, now regarded as just another form of entertainment.