The post-PASPA era.
The Grand Canyon State narrowly missed a 10th consecutive month with $400 million worth of accepted wagers, falling short for the first time since last August. Despite missing the benchmark, Arizona did finish June ranked fifth nationally for handle — the first time it cracked the Top 5 for a month since launch in September 2021.
Sportsbook operators reported $28.3 million in gross revenue before any deductions and promotional credits were counted, resulting in a pedestrian hold of 7.2%. Promotional credits were a year-low $11.4 million, and the half-year total of $90.9 million is down 2% compared to the first six months of 2022. The state was eligible to tax $16.4 million in adjusted gross revenue, leading to more than $1.6 million in tax receipts.
Year-to-date gross revenue is up 32.6% compared to last year at $263.4 million thanks in part to an 8.2% hold that is 24.8% higher than 2022. The state has been able to levy taxes on 63.4% of gross revenue thus far in 2023, notably higher than the 53.3% for the comparable period last year. The $16.6 million in tax revenue is currently $5.6 million ahead of last year’s pace.
Desert Diamond’s wild ride continues h496g
| Month | Handle | Gross Revenue | Hold |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | $20,029,144 | $2,830,454 | 14.13% |
| February | $43,679,631 | $301,208 | 0.69% |
| March | $28,060,156 | ($1,276,869) | (4.55%) |
| April | $12,115,941 | $1,354,123 | 11.18% |
| May | $10,189,482 | ($177,332) | (1.74%) |
| June | $9,939,629 | $1,051,413 | 10.58% |
| TOTALS | $124,013,983 | $4,082,997 | 3.29% |
One of the biggest single-state top-rated $1.3 million in March.
Its fortunes swung to the positive in June, keeping nearly $1.1 million in winnings with a hold of 10.6%. That was a turnaround of $1.2 million from May, when bettors came out more than $177,000 ahead on $10.2 million wagered. Desert Diamond was also the only book in the state with at least $1 million handle in June to post a double-digit hold.
Among the national mobile operators, handle and revenue figures are published.
Longtime rival Caesars Sports completed the group of five operators to reach at least $1 million in revenue in June, finishing at $1.5 million with a 3.9% hold on $39.9 million handle.
Arizona would be one of the eight states whose mobile marketplace it would be leaving, endured its worst month in the state since launch, claiming less than $14,000 from $3.6 million worth of accepted bets to post a hold below 0.4%. It was the sixth time in the last 13 months WynnBET had a sub-5% hold.
Barstool Sportsbook, which rounded out the top five in handle at $11.3 million, was sixth in revenue with more than $625,000. The PENN Entertainment book, which will be rebranded to ESPN BET in the fall, has a 5.1% win rate on the year with nearly $5 million in gross revenue from $98.5 million handle.
Golden Nugget (-$3,611).
Unprecedented success nationally 495g6i
June was still a good month for the house nationally, as total handle sured $6.6 billion and gross revenue finished just short of $550 million, resulting in an 8.3% hold. Despite it being more than a full percentage point above the industry standard of 7%, it beat out only February’s 7.9% win rate for the first six months of action.
The opening half of 2023 combined with the final six months of 2022 marked a period of unprecedented success for sportsbook operators nationwide in the post-PASPA era. The nationwide hold among commercial sportsbooks in that 12-month span was 9.4%, as they claimed $9.6 billion in gross revenue from $102.8 billion handle.
Year-over-year handle surged 28% in that time frame, boosted by the entries of large-market states Ohio and Massachusetts. Operator gross revenue in those 12 months, however, was up a whopping 72.7% compared to July 2021 through June 2022 — a difference of nearly $4.1 billion.
