Pennsylvanians Turn to Online Casino & Online Poker in April (Revenue Up)
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The Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board released their April revenue numbers on Monday. You can find our PA Online Gaming Revenue Tracker on Lineups.com as well. April revenue came in at $46,118,605 for the state of Pennsylvania. This is an 85 percent decrease from their $301,729,144 January revenue before the pandemic hit the U.S. Casinos and sportsbooks across the state have been hit hard from COVID-19, as no one is able to open their doors. Slots and table games generated $0 in revenue in April with the stay at home order in place.
How Pennsylvania is Adapting
Although casinos across the state are down a significant amount of revenue, there is some hope. With casinos closed, people are flocking to online gaming and poker. Revenue is up across the board in online poker, table games, and slots. A total of $632,425,292 was wagered in online table games in April. This is a 30 percent increase from March 2020 numbers. Also, $757,547,885 was wagered in online slots. Another increase from March when Pennsylvania saw $385,895,637 wagered online.
Sports betting is down, but the state casinos still generated $2,883,471. This is still down significantly from the $22,841,192 revenue generated in January. A significant amount of sports across the world had to shutdown their leagues as COVID-19 had peaked.
With casinos closed in Pennsylvania, they will need to promote online wagering to help increase revenue. Online still doesn’t give the same experience, but it’s still better than nothing. They will need to figure out how to adapt until people can start coming back in to wager.
Can May See An Increase In Revenue?
Pennsylvania should see an uptick in revenue in the month of May. They still won’t be anywhere near their January revenue numbers however. One thing casino’s can rely on is their sportsbooks. Some individual sports like UFC, NASCAR, and PGA have started back up here in the states. Also, leagues across the world like the CPBL, KBO, and Bundesliga are up in other countries.
This will help provide more revenue for Pennsylvania gaming as people try to find different sports to be on outside the MLB, NHL, and NBA, which would all be going on right now. This isn’t a perfect fix, but it’s better than nothing. Books should see an uptick from the $2,883,471 wagered in April. Across the country, some sportsbooks are already seeing revenue numbers higher in May than they did in April. Pennsylvania should be another state that sees the same thing.
Also, if Pennsylvania can continue to promote online gaming, then this should help increase revenue from April. Casinos are ultimately going to be hurt until they can open their doors. However, there are ways to keep wagers coming in during the lockdown. If the state eases restrictions that will help, but they still won’t be able to be at full capacity until the spread of COVID-19 is contained.
Sports betting will also help as more leagues continue to start back up. This will help generate more revenue as everyone stays at home. States allowing people to make online wagers will be huge to generate more revenue, so no one needs to leave their house and come in contact with anyone.
April was most likely the worst month for Pennsylvania casino’s, and they should start seeing revenue increase from here on out.