Tilman Fertitta Enters Online Poker Industry With Caesars Purchase

Only a couple years after Caesars sold the World Series of Poker brand to GGPoker, Golden Nugget owner Tilman Fertitta is acquiring Caesars Entertainment for $5.7 billion. As part of the purchase, Fertitta also takes on $11.9 billion in debt. The acquisition includes Caesars' Las Vegas Strip properties like the Horseshoe and Paris, home to the WSOP. Beyond adding Caesars properties across the country, Fertitta is back in the online gambling industry. Fertitta takes control of the company's digital casino, poker, and sports betting operations. In 2021, Fertitta sold Golden Nugget's online gaming platform to DraftKings for $1.56 billion. He now acquires a large online gaming enterprise that produced earnings of $69 million in the first quarter of this year. Those figures are up from the $43 million in the same quarter of 2025.