Park Place Beats Wall Street’s Bet

Las Vegas-based Park Place Entertainment Corp., the largest casino company, had a first-quarter loss of $939 million, or $3.09 a share, compared with profit of $45 million, or 15 cents, a year earlier. The loss followed a write-down of nearly $1 billion related to the company’s acquisition of Bally Entertainment and Caesars World.

Revenue was unchanged at $1.16 billion.

Excluding the write-down, Park Place had a profit of $40million, or 13 cents a share. On that basis, Park Place beat Wall Street’s expectations of 9 cents.

Park Place shares fell 39 cents to $11.90 on the NYSE.