Virginians placed $545.1m worth of bets during February. This is a 25,6% increase compared to the same time period in 2023. The state received $6.3m from sportsbooks in tax and their hold was 9.18%.
Taxes on sportsbooks are 15% of adjusted gross revenue. Virginia Lottery’s wagering report shows that 11 operators ended the month with a “net positive adjusted gross revenue”.
The mobile betting sector accounted for 540m dollars of total bets, while retail wagering accounted $4.9m. The number of promotions and deductions has continued to decline. Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin went further after a senator suggested a limit on operators’ ability to deduct promotional expenses in 2023. He included in his budget a sunset of 12 months on these deductions.
Four new operators will also be active in Virginia in 2023: Bet365, Betfred and Betr.
Bet365, Betfred and SuperBook are the only two operators that have the right to deduct promotional play. No operator will be able to take promotional play into account if no new operators launch in the state before 2024.
Note that Fanatics Sportsbook and ESPN BET (14 and 21 November 2023) reskinned their existing platforms and therefore are not eligible for the deduction. Fanatics Sportsbook used to be called PointsBet and ESPN BET, Barstool Sportsbook.
Handle in Virginia, AGR and hold were all down compared to January. According to Sports Handle’s tax and revenue database, in January sportsbooks paid $9.9m of taxes and had a win rate adjusted at 10.34%.
In its annual betting revenues report, the lottery doesn’t provide any information on how individual sportsbooks or betting markets performed.
These reports will be the last to come out before North Carolina joins in. North Carolina is the largest state that has launched so far this season. The operators went live early March, just a few days before March Madness in the US, which is the largest betting event in the country.
