Feb. 24 (Bloomberg) -- Wynn Resorts Ltd., the biggest U.S. casino company by market value, reported a fourth-quarter loss as gambling tumbled in Las Vegas and it booked a $98.8 million tax expense.

The net loss was $159.6 million, or $1.49 a share, compared with profit of $65.5 million, or 57 cents, a year earlier, Wynn said today in a statement. Profit excluding some items was 7 cents, missing the 43-cent average of 16 estimates compiled by Bloomberg.

Revenue declined 14 percent to $614.3 million. The results show billionaire Stephen Wynn’s high-end casinos aren’t immune to a recession-driven gambling and travel contraction that delivered the Las Vegas Strip its worst annual gaming decline.

Wynn, based in Las Vegas, fell 7.8 percent after U.S. markets closed. The shares rose 11 percent to $25.80 in Nasdaq Stock Market composite trading today before the announcement. Wynn stock fell 62 percent last year.

Las Vegas slot-machine gambling revenue dropped 23 percent to $829.7 million in the fourth quarter. Table-game betting fell 20 percent to $498.3 million, while the casino “hold,” or the amount the company won, fell to 15.3 percent of the amount gambled, from 23.5 percent.

The revenue Wynn gets for each available room at Wynn Las Vegas, a measure of rates and occupancy called Revpar, fell 20 percent in the quarter, to $224.

‘Substantially Worse’

“Starting in October, we experienced a dramatic deceleration in business,” Wynn said today in the statement. “The fourth quarter of 2008 was substantially worse than during the prior year as consumers chose to stay at home and significantly reduced their leisure budgets.”

Wynn Resorts said Feb. 3 it would cut all Las Vegas-based salaried employees’ pay, reduce hours for others, and eliminate 2009 bonuses and company matches of retirement-savings contributions to preserve jobs and save up to $100 million in annual costs.

Industrywide, Las Vegas Strip casino gambling revenue slid 11 percent last year, the biggest annual decline on record. Airlines have cut almost 15 percent of their passenger flight capacity through Vegas as developers prepare to open more than 13,000 new hotel rooms in the city this year.

In Macau, revenue rose 1.2 percent in the quarter to $392.2 million. Adjusted earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization fell 4.6 percent to $95 million.

To contact the reporter on this story: Beth Jinks in New York at bjinks1@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: February 24, 2009 16:41 EST