Wynn Resorts paying $130M for letting illegal money reach gamblers at its Las Vegas Strip casino
It allowed unlicensed money transfers from around the world to reach gamblers.
LAS VEGAS — Casino company Wynn Resorts Ltd. has agreed to pay $130 million to federal authorities and admit that it let unlicensed money transfer businesses around the world funnel funds to gamblers at its flagship Las Vegas Strip property.
The publicly traded company said a non-prosecution settlement reached Friday represented a monetary figure identified by the U.S. Justice Department as “funds involved in the transactions at issue” at the Wynn Las Vegas resort.
In statements to the media and to the federal Securities and Exchange Commission, the company said the forfeiture wasn’t a fine and findings in the decade-long case didn’t amount to money laundering.
U.S. Attorney Tara McGrath in San Diego said the settlement showed that casinos are accountable if they let foreign customers evade U.S. laws. She said $130 million was believed to be the largest forfeiture by a casino “based on admissions of criminal wrongdoing.”
Wynn Resorts said it severed ties with all people and businesses involved in what the government characterized as “convoluted transactions” overseas.
“Several former employees facilitated the use of unlicensed money transmitting businesses, which both violated our internal policies and the law, and for which we take responsibility,” the company said in a statement Saturday to The Associated Press.
In its news release, the Justice Department detailed several methods it said were used to transfer money between Wynn Las Vegas and people in China and other countries.
One, dubbed “Flying Money,” involved an unlicensed money agent using multiple foreign bank accounts to transfer money to the casino for use by a patron who could
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