Station Casino owners consider cash infusion

Station Casinos’ owners are contemplating putting more of their own money into the firm to weather the current economic storm.

They could loan the company between USD 450 million and USD 500 million, as well as conduct a debt exchange, to reduce the locals gaming company’s debt load and related interest payments, a filing Tuesday with the Securities and Exchange Commission said.

Station Casinos had USD 5.4 billion in long-term debt for the third quarter ended September 30, paying USD 281.9 million in interest payments during that nine-month period.

The filing did not specify which of the owners – the Fertitta family or Los Angeles-based real estate firm Colony Capital – is infusing the locals gaming company with cash, saying that „entities affiliated with existing equity owners … or institutions or persons who are investors“ will provide the loan.

Colony Capital owns 75.9 of the company. Members of the founding family, the Fertittas, owning 24.1 . The Fertitta family, which includes company Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Frank Fertitta III, Vice Chairman Lorenzo Fertitta and sister Delise Sartini, invested USD 870.5 million worth of stock toward the USD 5.4 billion buyout, which closed in November 2007. Colony Capital invested USD 2.6 billion in cash for its equity share.

Station Casinos also announced Tuesday it hopes to issue a pair of 10 secured term loans due in 2016, pushing the earliest maturity date back four years. The private exchange of up to USD 459 million would involve five sets of unsecured notes worth a combined USD 2.088 billion, with rates ranging from 6 to 7.75 %.

Some of the notes, which were trading as low as 8 cents on the dollar on Friday, are being offered to be bought back at 54 cents on the dollar. The exchange offer is contingent on 60 % of the old notes being tendered before midnight on December 5.

If 82.5 % of the old notes are exchanged, the new ownership’s loan would take the form of unsecured, junior subordinate loans.