At nearly six o’clock on a Tuesday night in late December, about 500 gamblers are lined up at the Golden Gate casino on Fremont Street in Downtown Las Vegas to pick up a ticket for a couple of free drinks with Derek Stevens, its billionaire owner. The dancing bartenders, as they are known, dressed in bralettes, panties and go-go boots, shake their hips to the Black Eyed Peas’ “I Gotta Feeling” as two guests make their way over to shake his hand.

“Every casino needs its own attraction, and people are attracted to an open bar,” says Stevens, 58, who bought this property, the oldest hotel and casino in Las Vegas, in 2006 as well as The D, which is just down the street, five years later. Across Fremont is his crown jewel: Circa, which he opened in 2020 at a cost of $1 billion.

Each drink voucher comes with a golden envelope, which usually contains $5 pre-loaded on a card but it could be as high as $1,000. The Golden Gate hosts this very happy hour every night, 7 days a week, and it’s safe to say that gamblers spend more money on the slots than they cost the casino with their free drinks. An employee hands Stevens a microphone and the music stops.

“I've always thought that there is nothing better in Vegas than if you can get a couple of drinks in you and maybe hit a jackpot,” he says to the crowd. “That's how the night starts. And I appreciate you wanting to have your night start here.”

Stevens, who is wearing a white oxford under a blue suit with a Richard Mille watch, is the last of a dying breed in Las Vegas: the independent casino mogul. With his three properties, which he owns with his younger brother, Greg, Stevens is worth $1.2 billion, Forbes estimates. In a town built by legends like Jay Sarno, Kirk Kerkorian, Benny Binion, and later reinvented by Steve Wynn and Sheldon Adelson, almost all the big operators today, from MGM to Caesars, sold their land and buildings to REITs, keeping the operations and paying rent. But Stevens owns it all, even the dirt under his properties. And while casinos on the Strip have been hit hard by a decline in foreign visitors in the past year, Downtown Vegas has been buoyed by American gamblers, attracted to cheaper hotel rooms, the walkability of Fremont Street and the spectacle of Circa.

Standing 60 stories high on the corner of Fremont and Main Street and looking like a cruise ship, Circa is the only high-end game in town when it comes to Downtown Las Vegas. Boyd’s Fremont Casino is bright and nostalgic, yet depressing with a tiny sports book, old slots and even older customers. At Tilman Fertitta’s Golden Nugget, you might run into your aunt, who could have also decorated the place. And then there’s Binion’s, the casino that started the World Series of Poker in 1970—and looks like it hasn’t been renovated since.

But Circa is something else. It’s an attraction, which, after all, is what Vegas is all about. With the world’s largest........

© Forbes