Gaming Commission approves licensing for Hard Rock executive

A key executive for Hard Rock Las Vegas was unanimously approved for licensing Thursday by the Nevada Gaming Commission, the first of several approvals anticipated as the shuttered Mirage transitions to a new Strip resort.

Vincent Zahn, executive vice president and chief financial officer of Seminole Hard Rock International LLC and its subsidiaries, was approved after a half-hour suitability hearing in Carson City.

Zahn, a former Nevada resident who moved to Florida to join Hard Rock, had told the Nevada Gaming Control Board on Nov. 6 that he aspired to be a Wall Street investment banker when he lived in northern New Jersey and attended New York’s Fordham University.

He worked with Merrill Lynch covering gaming industry companies and eventually went to work for Pinnacle Entertainment and Wynn Resorts before being recruited by Hard Rock, which bought The Mirage from MGM Resorts International for $1.07 billion in December 2022.

Hard Rock, owned by the Seminole Indian Tribe of Florida, closed The Mirage on July 17 after 34 years in business and announced it would expand the property with a guitar-shaped hotel tower replacing the iconic Mirage volcano.

Zahn told commissioners when in Nevada, he served a year on the Nevada Economic Forum, which advises the government about the state budget through reviews of tax revenue, including gaming.

“I was appointed to the Economic Forum in 2022 by Gov. (Steve) Sisolak into a role that traditionally someone at Wynn Resorts had filled,” Zahn told commissioners. “The forum is tasked with evaluating and analyzing the various tax revenue streams that the state takes in, whether it’s live entertainment tax, gaming tax, various insurance and surplus lines tax, employment taxes, etc., analyzing those, evaluating those based upon materials and presentations made by all the relevant government finance departments, and all the other ministries and areas within the government that have influence over those revenue streams.”

Zahn oversees 120 Hard Rock employees, reports to Hard Rock Chairman and CEO Jim Allen and makes frequent trips to Las Vegas as the transition occurs toward a planned opening in 2027.

Contact Richard N. Velotta at rvelotta@reviewjournal.com or 702-477-3893. Follow @RickVelotta on X.