Online betting gets my vote for the Next Big Thing. The ubiquitous TV commercials may indicate that it’s already here, but the industry is actually still in its infancy. The American Gaming Association reports that sports-betting revenues—both online and in what are called the sportsbook sections of brick-and-mortar casinos—increased 436% for the first seven months of 2021 compared with the same period a year earlier and 539% over 2019. But the total came to just $2.1 billion, compared with the $150 billion that the AGA estimates is bet illegally each year, including $10 billion on March Madness alone.
My guess is that legal businesses have the capital and the marketing smarts to grab at least half the illegal revenues in the next decade while growing the overall pie in a delicious way. I can imagine gambling as a platform for other financial endeavors, including lending. The question is which companies will be the big winners.
Bracket crazy. Betting on football and basketball, especially, is a popular American pastime, but it wasn’t until a Supreme Court decision in 2018 that sports betting received the blessing of law nationwide. Years earlier, states began passing their own laws, defying bans and opening the floodgates. According to ESPN’s tracker, updated through September 29, some 27 states have launched sports-betting markets, 11 of them online, and another five states have passed legislation to do so.
In the past, casino companies fought legalization, but they’re now embracing a brave new world by acquiring companies with experience in internet betting not just on sports but on elections and on online versions of casino games. Consider one of my favorites in the group, Caesars Entertainment , which operates 54 casinos in 16 states, including nine in Nevada alone. The Roman Empire–themed Caesars Palace complex in Las Vegas has 3,960 rooms and 124,000 square feet of gaming space on 85 acres. The Palace’s enormous sportsbook offers a 143-foot screen that displays horse racing, football games, boxing matches and other events as they happen. (Stocks and funds I like are in bold.)
The company had entered into a joint venture with William […]
Click here to view original web page at www.kiplinger.com
