Wagers totaled nearly $2 billion during the first month of legal mobile sports betting in New York. And that doesn’t include figures from the Super Bowl.
Since mobile sports betting started on January 8th, New York recorded $1.98 billion in wagers.
The numbers released on Monday show the total Gross Gaming Revenue was over $138 million. With a 51 percent tax rate, that brings in just over $70 million in tax revenue for the state. Those figures don’t include betting’s biggest day, the Super Bowl. Final numbers are to be released Friday.
Governor Kathy Hochul this week said the success proves mobile sports betting can be an “economic engine for New York,” with most of the state’s proceeds being directed to education.
This week, the American Gaming Association trade group hosted its Annual State of the Industry presentation.
AGA CEO Bill Miller called the enthusiasm for New York mobile sports betting an exciting first step, but couldn’t make a prediction for how sustainable the numbers will be.
Before New York opened sportsbooks last month, neighboring New Jersey legalized online sports betting, in 2018.
“Certainly, New Jersey had been a great beneficiary to the fact that New York didn’t have the legal option for New Yorkers. They say the PATH trains were filled on Saturdays and Sundays from people going to Hoboken and Jersey City. And so we believe that things will rationalize in that general area, but I think that it’s too early to tell whether or not New York will sustain in the same way that the launch has,” said Miller.
In an interview with WAMC ahead of Sunday’s Super Bowl, PlayNY.com lead writer Mike Mazzeo said New York was estimated to see $160 million in handle from the matchup between the Rams and the Bengals – that would be a new record, if not for the estimated $175 million in Nevada.
To attract gamblers, mobile sports betting platforms lined up big incentives, too – with some offering hundreds of dollars in free bets.
That’s a factor that needs to be considered when attempting to make a prediction about the future of mobile sports betting, according to Mazzeo.
“Whether promos are as good and as lucrative as they are going forward, I think that’s probably not going to be the case. And so, sustainability wise, a lot of people are betting in New York. But we’ll see if they decide to go in alternate directions – do they decide to go offshore or with their local bookie? New York is offering the same juice as other states and so that doesn’t seem to be a problem, but with 51 percent tax rate, sustainability wise, we’ll see there,” said Mazzeo.
Mazzeo said New York’s online gambling era benefited from good timing — during the NFL playoffs.
He says the return of the regular NFL season later this year could bring another boom in betting.
“NFL season is pretty much the most popular thing you can bet on in America and then so we’ll see right? In those general days when there’s just NBA and NHL regular season games, how does that do? And then hopefully you get baseball back and then you go right into the summer with the playoffs, and then I think the intensity goes right back up. Well, there’s going to be a lot of buzz, you know? ‘Who are you taking.’ And then you go back into the regular NFL season – September, October– and so that’s going to be a huge boom to think, that first regular FBL season. And so, yeah, strong start. They may dip a little bit but then six months, eight months we’ll see how they’re doing.”
New York State is betting on the success of mobile sports betting.
Governor Hochul’s 2023 budget plan projects $249 million in revenues, including the $200 million already collected in licensing fees this fiscal year. The predictions go up from there — $357 million in fiscal year 2023, $465 million in FY 2024, and continuing up to $518 million in FY 2027.
With 98 percent of tax revenues going to education, 1 percent will go to youth sports programs, the other 1 percent to address problem gambling.
One state away, Governor Charlie Baker says Massachusetts has been missing out for years, saying he would sign a bill this year to legalize sports betting.
