Pennsylvania Sportsbooks Lose Money in February
The Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board has announced the gaming report for the month of February, and the numbers were shocking. Not only was there a clear drop in the total amount of bets placed during the month, but most of the Pennsylvania Sportsbooks actually lost money.
The total sports betting handle was just $597.1 million, which was a drop of nearly 25 percent from the month of January. This was still an increase from the February 2021 numbers, but this stopped the momentum that had been building in the state.
One of the biggest reasons for the decrease in the total sports betting handle was that the online handle suffered a major hit. Less NFL games was a big reason, and so too was a shorter month on the calendar.
The gross sports betting revenue was actually a loss of around $442,000, and that is where the biggest news came. February 2021 saw a total gross revenue of more than $16 million, but sportsbooks offered too many promotions last month.
Not all states allow sportsbooks to take out the promotional money before reporting revenue, but that isn’t the case with Pennsylvania Sportsbooks. The Super Bowl is always a massive sporting event and sportsbooks were able to report those promotions which hurt the overall numbers.
FanDuel Still in the Lead
Even though it was a rough month for the entire online sports betting industry in Pennsylvania, there were still some sportsbooks that did much better than the others. Pennsylvania has been able to attract nearly all of the biggest names in the industry, but it is FanDuel Sportsbook that is clearly at the top.
FanDuel posted a total sports betting handle of $213.1 million, and it was one of the few sportsbooks that had a revenue that was greater than the amount of promos that were paid out. DraftKings had the second highest handle for the month of February as that total was over $140 million.
BetMGM, Barstool, and BetRivers rounded out the top five, but none were close to tracking down the leaders.
All Gaming Numbers Go Down
Legal sports betting wasn’t the only industry to see some rough numbers in February as the entire gaming industry suffered. The shorter month clearly played a role, but there just wasn’t as much action at all of the gaming options in the state.
The gross revenue from table games was just $74.4 million during the month of February, a drop of nearly five percent from the numbers posted in January. There was still $1.99 billion gambled on slots, but that was a drop of nearly two percent as well.
The total handle and revenue from retail slots was about the only areas that actually saw some improvements during the month of March. Those numbers are going to rebound at some point, especially when it comes to sports betting.
See our article on on the March Sports Betting Numbers.
