Rumor: Downtown Grand Reportedly Stops Paying Vendors
The ongoing Downtown Grand saga has reached DEFCON 1, with the financial community and employees buzzing with rumors about the potential of the downtown casino going under.
We thought DEFCON 4 was worse than DEFCON 1, but DEFCON 1 is actually the highest level of readiness for nuclear war. DEFCON 4 is pretty chill by comparison. (See graphic later in this story.)
Yes, there’s going to be a lot of fluffery in this story, as nobody’s gone on the record and Downtown Grand and its owner CIM Group have been mum, but it’s bad.
We’ve heard from vendors confirming the rumor Downtown Grand has stopped paying their invoices. It’s impossible to operate a business without these folks, and they don’t play when it comes to being paid.
Downtown Grand has struggled for some time, but things really went south when a deal to be acquired by Penske Media Corp. fell through.
Business at Downtown Grand is rumored to have fallen off a cliff in recent months, as has happened at a number of Las Vegas casinos. Downtown Grand was already in trouble, according to multiple sources.
Our impression is CIM Group is over the financial losses, and it’s ready to dump Downtown Grand for peanuts just to make the bleeding stop.
We’ve chatted with several sources familiar with casino financing and operations, and they believe Downtown Grand could be facing foreclosure and a forced sale by its lenders.
CIM Group is a private company, so it doesn’t do reporting like public companies are required to do.
We don’t need experts to confirm refusing to pay vendors is a giant red flag, usually indicating financial distress and cash flow problems.
Such situations tend to precede companies filing for bankruptcy protection. That’s probably not the case here, as CIM isn’t in any trouble, it’s just this “asset.” That means it’s going to be cut loose.
No matter what happens next, it means vendors will be screwed, and they will stop doing what they do for Downtown Grand.
There will also be lawsuits galore, which means CIM will be forced to make some tough decisions in a very short time period. Some decisions are likely to be made by lenders.
Does Downtown Grand stay open during all this drama? Hard to say. It’s possible a new owner swoops in and takes advantage of the resort’s financial hardships to get Downtown Grand for a song. It could be a financial institution, which always bodes well, we said sarcastically.
CIM’s Web site proudly says, “Creating Value. Enhancing Communities.” It’s on the Internet, so it must be true.
CIM says it has “381 assets” across the Americas and Europe. So, Downtown Grand is a small fish in the company’s much larger pond. This particular pond is currently suffering from an explosive algae bloom.
Thoughts and positive vibes to the folks who work at Downtown Grand during this time of uncertainty. We don’t get the feeling Downtown Grand has been great at communicating what’s happening, apologies if you work there and this is how you’re hearing about this mess.
We reached out to CIM Group but have not gotten a response yet.
From what we can tell, more news is set to come out in the next week or two. There should be a DEFCON ZERO. Or, in the case of Downtown Grand, a negative number.
Awkward.
Update (7/30/25): Employees of Freedom Beat restaurant at Downtown Grand have been informed the restaurant is closed until further notice. The original version of this story included that the restaurant would close. We removed that information because employees shouldn’t find out they’re losing their jobs from a blog.
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