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What is Lion Festival?
The statue now stands, bargeless, mounted on a red-striped pedestal flanked by golden sphinxes.
Cleopatra’s Barge opened in September 1970 in what is now the Nobu Hotel tower, replacing the earlier Nero’s Nook lounge. The 180-seat lounge featured as its centerpiece a “floating” stage designed as a replica of the vessel aboard which the Egyptian queen is said to have bewitched Mark Antony.
The pleasure craft, installed in a shallow lagoon, featured a gold-painted, topless figurehead that extended far into the public walkway. Guests quickly turned rubbing the statue’s golden breasts for luck into a classic Vegas tradition; staff regularly repainted the most-touched areas.
Vital Vegas ranked the display No. 4 on his 2014 list of “10 Things You Can Rub for Good Luck in Las Vegas Without Getting Arrested,” a list that featured three other Caesars Palace entries: the hand of the Caesars statue (No. 1); Joe Louis’s boxing gloves (No. 8); and the toe of Michelangelo’s David replica (No. 9).
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Two operators alone – Kalshi and Polymarket – topped the combined $1 billion mark in NFL trading activity over the first six days of Week 1, according to numerous measures this week. During the period, Kalshi recorded NFL volume of $983.4 million, according to DeFi Rate, earning the pole position by a large margin. Mahomes and the Kansas City Chiefs thrashed the Denver Broncos 31-10 on Monday Night Football, capping the largest week for prediction markets ever.
Even before the primetime matchup in Kansas City, it became abundantly clear that the industry would shatter previous marks for weekly activity. The AFC West showdown bolstered the already robust totals. Overall, volume for the week hit a record $15.9 billion, according to Bank of America, up 16% from a week earlier.
The pure-play prediction market-operators, Polymarket and Kalshi, emerged from Week 1 as the clear winners. On one hand, Kalshi’s market share lead narrowed over its competitors, falling to 82% for the week ended 13 September, down from 86% a week earlier.
What is Lion Festival?
On Monday, the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) announced that Ruth Evans has succeeded Charles Counsell to take on the full time role of Gambling Commission chair.
Counsell took the helm in February 2025 following Marcus Boyle’s departure in January last year.
Evans, who chairs Stop Scams UK, an initiative she founded in 2019 to unite banks, technology companies and telecom providers to combat payment fraud, will assume the position on 30 September, commencing a five-year term.
