While we can't confirm the comments made by Bob and Tracy about all the 8.8.8 chips being sent to the Rio, we can confirm this:

About 2 months ago we received a call from the Rio looking for 500 gift boxes that hold 5 chips. We were told they were needed for "early August". Unfortunatly we did not get the job, and the person we spoke with did not know what the boxes were for. But it now seems obvious that the 8.8.8 chips were in fact collected from each property, packaged and given away.

All we can do now is wait for them to pop up on ebay.