Pennsylvania’s April Sports Betting Handle Down Almost 20% from March

Pennsylvania’s April Sports Betting Handle Down Almost 20% from March
Fact Checked by Pat McLoone

Pennsylvania sports betting took a bit of a sting last month.

According to official figures released by the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board (PGCB) on Tuesday, the state’s total sports wagering handle for April was a little more than $572.82 million.

That is down 19.9% from March, when the Keystone State posted a handle of close to $715 million, due in large part to the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament and Villanova’s Final Four run.

April’s number was up 19.5% from last year’s April total of $479.41 million.

Online sports betting, which accounted for 93.6% of the market, posted more than $536.1 million, a decrease of 19.6% from March ($666.98 million). However, the number was up 22.1% from April 2021 ($439.07 million).

Gross sports betting revenue proved to be on the favorable side, posting $33.67 million, up 10.7% from March’s $30.4 million and up 28% from April 2021 ($26.3 million).

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How the Casinos, Operators Fared

Valley Forge Casino Resort, which partners with FanDuel Sportsbook, was the runaway leader again in sports wagering with more $228.21 million in total handle and $22.82 million in total revenue from retail and online.

By comparison, Hollywood Casino at the Meadows, which has a partnership with Barstool Sports, was second in total handle with $120.35 million and total revenue (retail/online) at $3.496 million for April.

Pennsylvania has 18 operators offering sports betting, whether retail or online or both.


Pennsylvania Sports Betting, April vs. March

Total HandleMobile Handle Gross Revenue
April $572,818M $536.143M $33.667M
March $714.977M $666.982M $30.401M
Change Down 19.9% Down 19.6% Up 10.7%

 

Total Gambling Revenue Remains High

The state almost kept pace with its record-breaking March of $462.7 million in total Pennsylvania gambling revenue. Last month, Pennsylvania posted $461.62 million for all types of gambling, including brick-and-mortar casinos, online casino gambling, sports wagering, peer-to-peer poker and fantasy sports. April’s total number was an increase of 14% compared to revenue generated same time last year.

Pennsylvania is one of only a handful of U.S. states that has legal  Pennsylvania online casinos.

The previous record month for Pennsylvania gambling revenue was November 2021, at nearly $432.5 million.

Going inside the Pennsylvania gambling numbers, retail table games in April had gross gaming revenue (GGR) of nearly $91.49 million, down 3% from March’s $94.29 million.

Internet table games added another $33.48 million in revenue, down 6.2% from March’s $35.68 million.

Online slots added $76.71 million, down 3.1% from March ($79.2 million). Retail slots gross revenue had an uptick of 1.5% from March, coming in at $217.89 million from the previous month’s $214.72 million.

Among individual operators for overall total gaming revenue, Hollywood Casino at Penn National topped the monthly revenue chart once again with $65.58 million, up 22.5% from $53.53 million in April 2021.

Valley Forge was second with $57.36 million and Parx Casino rounded out the top three with $57.07 million.

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Author

Lou Monaco

Lou Monaco had been East Coast Scene columnist for Gaming Today in Las Vegas since June 2019, covering the East Coast sportsbook scene with emphasis on NJ and PA. He also currently is a part-time writer for the high school sports department for NJ Advanced Media (NJ.com) in Iselin, NJ. Lou has over 30 years sports experience with previous stints at ESPN SportsTicker, Daily Racing Form and Oddschecker.

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