It’s been just over a year since Arizona legalized sports betting and the industry is off to a strong start! The Arizona Department of Gaming (ADG) released August’s sports betting numbers yesterday, showing that the state’s retail and online sportsbooks handled $361 million in bets during the month.
Arizona Betting Numbers
As per the report released by ADG, Arizona sportsbooks retained $37,161,759 of the bets for a 10.3% hold rate which is well above the 7.6% hold rate last in July. The state also benefited as it generated $2.76 million in taxes.
ADG Director Ted Vogt expressed his excitement after seeing the August results:
“I am excited to see such strong wagering figures for August, which is the final monthly report for Arizona’s first year of legal sports betting.”
This makes the Grand Canyon State among the top sports gambling market in the county.
Max Hartgraves of ADG stated that the market exceeded the expectation and was the fastest state to reach a billion sports bets, outside New York.
“We’ve seen over $5.4 billion wagered in the state in its first year of legal operations and that’s resulted in just over $20 million in privilege fees, $21 million in privilege fees actually to the state from these new games,” he added.
These betting numbers are expected to further increase as Arizona will host some of the biggest sporting events starting on December 31, when it will host College Football Playoff National Championship.
It will also be the first state with legalized sports gambling to host the Super Bowl which will take place in February 2023.
One Year of Sports Betting in Arizona
Arizona sports betting was launched last September 2021 and by the end of its first month, eight operators have already commenced operations. DraftKings sportsbook leads the pack as it accounts for 33% of the market share at that time with four other brands also sharing more than 10% of the market.
After a year of operations, there are already 18 online bookmarkers and the regulators recently allowed 10 limited event retail operators. DraftKings still leads the market but not by far compared to Fanduel. Here’s a quick look:
- DraftKings: 36%
- FanDuel: 30%
- BetMGM: 16%
- Caesars: 8%
- WynnBet: 2%
- Barstool Sportsbook: 2%
- BetRivers: 1%
- Hard Rock Sportsbook: 1%
This makes the top two sportsbooks account for two-thirds of the sports gambling market. AZ sportsbooks not mentioned above account only for less than a percent.
The promotional spending drop in AZ sports gambling was also noticeable as operators’ $31.2 million in free bets and other bonuses last September 2021 was slashed to only $8.5 million this August
