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US Sports Bettors Bring in a $2.1 Billion Handle for August
By Jeff Osienya Oct 07, 2020 IndustryAfter a historic low in April, the US gaming industry is showing strong recovery signs with sports betting and online gaming leading the way. For the first 7 months of 2020 however, the GGR is still behind what was collected over the same period in 2019.The American Gaming Association (AGA), the premier national trade group for USA’s $240 billion gambling industry has released a new report that shows that US sports bettors spent a whopping $2.1 billion in August. This is effectively the largest monthly handle that has ever been recorded in the USA in its history of sports betting.
Operators have to thank the huge comeback of sports events which gave players plenty of options to bet on after a long pandemic-induced sports hiatus. Overall, sports betting operators in the country collected an impressive revenue of $119.4 million from the record-breaking handle in August. The massive sports betting revenue on the other hand is the second highest-earning month ever recorded for US sportsbook operators, closely trailing January 2020’s revenue which topped $138.9 million.
Four States Surpassed the $100 Million Mark in Their August Handles
The incredible $2.1 billion betting handle was collected from 17 gambling legal states and Washington DC and it represented a monstrous 174.8% rise year on year. New Jersey led the pack with its own record-breaking August handle standing at $668.0 million. Similarly, operators' proceeds also experienced stunning growth as they collected 90.2% more compared to the same period in 2019.
Alongside the Garden States record-shattering stakes totals for August, four other states in the US saw their sports betting handle exceed $100 million in the same month. Nevada followed New Jersey with $475 million in total stakes whereas Pennsylvania came third after bettors spent a total of $365 million. Indiana trailed the top three states with a handle of $169.0 million while Colorado where sports betting has only been legal since May closed the centennial movers with stakes that reached $126 million.
August is the fourth consecutive month that nationwide gaming revenue has been on a growth curve since April’s historic COVID-19 fiasco, beating July’s numbers by 5.6%. Overall, the nationwide sports betting revenue for the first 7 months of this year is at $517.7 million, which is 31.5% higher than what was recorded over the same period in 2019. The total handle has also grown by 24.1% for the same period in 2020, year over year.
August’s Gross Gaming Revenue is Still Down Year-on-Year
Despite the shining numbers for sports betting, the Coronavirus pandemic continues to take a toll on the USA’s gaming industry. For August, the gross gaming revenue (GGR) across all gambling verticals including sports betting, stands at $3.0 billion, a figure that’s 19.8% lower than what was recorded for August 2019. The revenue garnered from slot machines was $1.9 billion while table games brought in $528 million, after a decline of 21.7% and 29% respectively.
According to an AGA spokesperson, all is not lost as nine of the 17 gambling legal states are already showing signs of recovering as their year over year decline in August revenue has significantly shrunk, compared to July. 8 states recorded gaming revenue that’s getting incredibly close to what it was last year even though their casinos are operating at limited capacities on floor occupancy and availability of games.
Better yet, the year-over-year gaming revenue for Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Mississippi has been on a winning streak for the second month in a row whereas South Dakotas has been recording year on year wins for the last three months. In fact, for August, casinos in Ohio even went as far as hitting an all-time high for their gaming revenue after collecting $172.1 million.
While online gaming has grown exponentially by 203% to bring in $923.1 million from January this year to date, the GGR for all gambling verticals in the US is still 39.4% lower than 2019’s at $17.5 billion due to the COVID-19 decline for brick-and-mortar casinos. The recovering sports betting revenue hasn’t been enough either to lead to a positive movement for the industry at large.
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