Jim Murren, chairman and chief executive officer of MGM Resorts International, plans to step down after a successor is appointed.
Photo: Kentaro Takahashi/Bloomberg NewsMGM Resorts International Chief Executive Jim Murren will leave the global casino operator after its board picks his successor, the company said.
Mr. Murren, who is also stepping down as chairman, has led the company since 2008. He is leaving before his contract expires at the end of 2021.
“When I thought through how I could best serve MGM going forward, I thought it was pretty clear that a leader should help lead a company into the next decade or two,” Mr. Murren said on a conference call with Wall Street analysts on Wednesday. “I wanted to make sure the board had the time, which it will use promptly, to do a robust search and find my successor.”
MGM Resorts, which has a market value of about $17 billion, didn’t give a firm date for Mr. Murren’s departure. The board has formed a search committee to find a new CEO, the company said. Mr. Murren said he anticipates being on MGM Resorts’ next quarterly earnings call, in about three months.
During Mr. Murren’s tenure, the company has shifted its focus away from gambling and into entertainment, resort offerings and sports betting in the U.S. He also oversaw MGM’s expansion in Asia, with the opening of two properties in Macau and the current push to secure a license in Osaka, Japan.
The company has also sold off much of its real estate, including deals with MGM Growth Properties, a real-estate investment trust MGM Resorts spun off in 2016, and other property deals. The company’s “asset-light” strategy is intended to pull cash out of the company’s valuable real estate, including prime locations on the Las Vegas Strip.
Among the Las Vegas Strip properties the company has sold to MGM Growth are the Mirage and Luxor resorts. It plans to rent them back from the real estate venture and continue operating them. It also sold Circus Circus on the Strip to Treasure Island owner Phil Ruffin last year. A joint venture that includes Blackstone Group Inc. agreed to buy the real estate of MGM Grand and Mandalay Bay resorts in a deal that values the properties at $4.6 billion. Last year, Blackstone said its real-estate investment trust, known as a BREIT, would take control of the Bellagio through a $4.25 billion joint venture with MGM.
MGM Resorts’ remaining company-owned real estate includes MGM Springfield in Massachusetts, a 50% stake in CityCenter in Las Vegas and more than half of MGM Growth Properties.
“In my 22 years with MGM Resorts, I’ve accomplished a lot, and I’m proud of the company it has become,” said Mr. Murren, who joined the company in 1998.
The company said Wednesday that it earned $2.01 billion on $3.19 billion revenue in the three months ended Dec. 31, 2019, versus a year-earlier loss of $23.3 million on $3.05 billion revenue. The latest quarter included a $2.7 billion gain from the Bellagio deal, the company said. For the full year 2019 it made $2.05 billion on $12.9 billion revenue, up from $466.8 million net income in 2018, on $11.76 billion revenue.
—Maria Armental contributed to this article.
Write to Katherine Sayre at katherine.sayre@wsj.com
Corrections & Amplifications
Jim Murren’s contract ends Dec. 31, 2021. An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated Dec. 31. (Feb. 12, 2020)
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