Starwood Denies Receiving Bid From Ocean Fund Net Porn Firm

WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. —  Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc. said Tuesday it never received a bid from an Internet porn company for its Caesars World casino chain, and Park Place Entertainment Corp., which already agreed to buy Caesars, said it won’t respond to the offer.

Ocean Fund International, which says it runs the world’s largest Internet sex site, said in a statement Monday night that it offered $3.6 billion in cash for the eight Caesars casinos.

Closely held Ocean Fund, which described itself as a mutual fund company based in the British Virgin Islands, has the $3.6-billion cash available for the purchase, so it would not need financing, spokesman Bob Davis said.

Starwood, the world’s largest hotel owner, agreed in April to sell the Caesars gambling resorts to Park Place, the world’s largest casino company, for $3 billion. Both companies said they plan to complete the purchase.

“We have never heard of Ocean Fund, and we have not received an offer from them,” Jim Gallagher, a spokesman for Starwood, said Tuesday.

Gallagher said he told the same thing, sarcastically, to an Ocean Fund executive he spoke to Tuesday morning, “I told them when you send a $3.6-billion offer through the U.S. Postal Service, sometimes it takes some time.”

Park Place said it did receive the offer but still expects its purchase of Caesars to close as planned in the fourth quarter.

“The offer came from a Salt Lake City-based individual claiming to be a lawyer acting on behalf of Ocean Fund International, a purported British Virgin Islands mutual fund,” Park Place said in a statement.

Salt Lake City-based attorney Bob Meredith, representing Ocean Fund, said in an interview that he faxed letters to both companies last night.

He also said, however, that he now thinks Ocean Fund might have trouble winning approvals from state gambling regulators to operate casinos.

Shares in White Plains, N.Y.-based Starwood rose 44 cents to close at $31.88 on the New York Stock Exchange. Park Place closed down 19 cents at $9.50, also on the NYSE.

Ocean Fund said its bid covers casinos in Las Vegas and Lake Tahoe, Nevada, Mississippi, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Indiana and Caesars properties under construction in Africa.