Communicated Content – New York has become something of a poster child for the US since launching its successful online sports betting campaign back at the start of the year – it had an extremely impressive opening month with nearly $2 billion in wagers placed and millions of players taking advantage of opportunities like this energy casino promo code too. As the year is starting to approach its end, the figures have dipped slightly but still show an impressive opportunity to continue growth in the iGaming space as the state has brought in over $300 million in tax revenue from sports betting this year alone.
For much of the US, other forms of iGaming have been a very difficult issue to address, whilst sports betting has found growth of support over the past four years with over thirty states now having passed legislation and legalizing the practice, other forms of iGaming have been much more limited with only Connecticut, Delaware, Michigan, West Virginia, and neighbors New Jersey and Pennsylvania having legalized anything that falls under the iGaming banner, with Nevada also having limited this option by legalizing online poker.
There has been plenty of discussion in the state around whether a change would be possible before 2023, and there have been a number of talking points that could address whether this would be a possibility.
- Measure the success of the online sports betting market which launched at the start of the year
- Decide the successful applicants for the three downstate retail casino licenses
- Create a Problem Gambling Advisory Council (PGAC)
For many, the sports betting figures speak for themselves, and the first year, although not yet complete, could only be deemed as a huge success. Experts have suggested that legalizing iGaming in New York could lead to an additional $400 million in tax, which in combination with the sports betting market could see a nearly additional $1 billion in tax revenue for the state, as it stands these figures are just theorized but certainly ring true with what has already been seen both in New York and the success other states have found too.
The issue with a Problem Gambling Advisory Council may be one that takes additional time, however, as many countries around the world that have already legalized iGaming in one form or another have run into increasing issues with problem gambling and developing ways to curb this, fortunately, New York lawmakers will have access to a wealth of information from these other countries on how successful certain methods have been and be able to implement this into their own strategy without the trial run experienced in these other countries without that same experience, but until a real-world test has been seen, there can’t be any certainty in how effective the solutions proposed will be.
New York’s downstate casino retail casino licenses should be something of a non-factor when it comes time to decide whether iGaming services can launch however, many of the same applicants will likely be just as interested in pursuing licensing for online mobile gaming services but given the difficulties around any casino legislation not to mention online casino legislation, it’s no surprise there would be additional red tape around any process to move things forward.
Despite the above, a precedent has been set with the online sports betting market and so far lawmakers do seem favorable to approving some form of iGaming within the state, with little news changed in over a month it does cast doubts on whether this will be a possibility at all in early 2023, but there’s a very real possibility that New York could find itself added to the list of few states offering these iGaming services sometime next year and be another to capitalize on the huge tax revenue generated by these services and the huge population that will take advantage of officially sanctioned services.
