Icahn Enterprises sells casinos, resorts to Gaming and Leisure

April 16 (UPI) -- Hedge fund manager Carl Icahn's Ichan Enterprises said Monday it is leaving the casino industry with a $1.85 billion sale of its gambling properties.

The deal trasfers six of the eight casinos in Icahn Enterprises subsidiary Tropicana Entertainment to Gaming and Leisure Properties. The casino operations will be leased to Eldorado Resorts, which will pay $640 million and enter into a 15-year lease on the Gaming and Leisure real estate. A Tropicana-owned casino in Aruba will be sold separately, a company statement said.

Ichan Enterprises' strategy has long been to buy undervalued assets, improve them and then resell them.

"Icahn Enterprises first acquired an interest in Tropicana in 2008. Tropicana was bankrupt and desperately needed new leadership...By hiring a great CEO in Tony Rodio and a great management team, and by reinvesting every single penny of profits back into the company, we turned Tropicana into a great casino company that today owns seven casinos," Ichan said in the statement.

The Las Vegas-based Tropicana casinos and resorts included in the deal are in Indiana, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nevada, Missouri and New Jersey. Eldorado Resorts owns 20 gambling properties in 10 states. The transaction is expected to close later in 2018, subject to gaming regulatory and other conditions.