Aa record performance from Pennsylvania’s online gambling market in September helped push overall market revenue in the state up 1.1% year-on-year.
Total revenue for September amounted to $284.2m, slightly up from $281.2m in the same month last year, but down 8.4% from $310.4m in August this year.
This growth was down to the stellar performance of igaming, with revenue here rocketing 1,290.2% from just $4.1m in September 2019 to $57.0m this year. This surpassed the existing $55.9m record set last month.
Revenue from online slots amounted to $39.9m, while internet table games revenue reached $14.7m. There was also an additional $2.4m in online poker revenue, courtesy of the Mount Airy Casino Resort and its partner PokerStars.
Rivers Casino Philadelphia led the state’s online gambling market in September with $16.1m in revenue, ahead of Penn National and partners DraftKings with $10.2m, and the Valley Forge Casino Resort and FanDuel on $9.1m.
Mount Airy Casino Resort posted $6.6m in overall igaming revenue for the month, just ahead of Parx Casino on $6.2m, followed by the Hollywood Casino at Penn National with $4.6m and the Mohegan Sun Pocono on $2.4m.
Looking at sports betting, revenue was down by 57.7% from $14.9m in September of 2019 to $6.3m this year, due to a number of operators posting losses for the month. This amount also represented a 65.6% month-on-month drop from $18.3m in August.
This decline came despite consumers spending more than double the amount on sports betting than last year, with the state’s handle jumping 137.9% from $194.5m to $462.8m.
Retail sports betting revenue overtook online in September, with land-based sportsbooks generating $5.1m in revenue, compared to $1.1m from online. However, the latter was impacted by operators’ losses.
The Hollywood Casino at Penn National reported an online loss of $2.8m, which led to an overall loss of $2.4m for the month. The Meadows Casino boasted a handle of $118.8m, but an online loss of $1.2m led to a total loss of $920,180, while the Mohegan Sun Pocono posted an online loss totalling $189,599.
The Valley Forge Casino Resort and FanDuel proved to be the most successful operators in the sports betting market last month, with revenue amounting to $2.7m from market-leading handle of $171.2m.
Parx Casino ranked second with $2.2m in revenue from a $29.3m handle, while Rivers Philadelphia was the only other operator to generate in excess of $1m in sports betting revenue in September, with its total reaching $2.0m for the month.
However, it was better news for the state’s fantasy sports market, with revenue rising 10.4% year-on-year to $3.2m. DraftKings led the sector with $1.8m in revenue, ahead of main rival FanDuel on $1.4m.
In addition, to a fall in sports betting revenue, the PGCB noted further declines in the state’s land-based casino market, primarily due to ongoing retractions on venues due to the novel coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic.
Land-based slots revenue fell 16.4% year-on-year to $157.4m, as the number of active machines slumped 29.3% from 23,154 to 16,360. Table game revenue also dropped 16.2% to $59.2m in the month.
Revenue from video game terminals reached $2.4m for the month, with players having spent a total of $26.2m on such machines during September.
For the year through to the end of September, total gambling market revenue in Pennsylvania stood at $3.59bn. Online gambling revenue reached $407.1m, with sports betting at $146.4m, retail slots $2.20bn and land-based table games $821.3m.