Tennessee Sports Betting Nears Record With $205 Million Wagered in March
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The Tennessee Education Lottery has finally released the numbers for March 1st through March 31st. The sports betting handle for March came in at a worth of $205.9 million, which is only second to the January 2021 handle. This is a significant increase on the $176.3 million wagered in February,
The total revenue achieved by sportsbooks came in at $16.1 million, again only second to January, which came in at $21.8 million. This was a solid month for Tennessee sportsbooks as they came out with a 7.8% hold. This led to a total of $3.2 million in taxes. Out of the revenues released so far, this tax income is only second to the largest states for sports betting, Pennsylvania and New Jersey.
Unfortunately, these are all of the numbers listed on the Tennessee Education Lottery’s report regarding sports betting. Unlike other states, there is no breakdown based on sport or sportsbooks with the report. There are only four items listed: handle, payouts, adjusted gross income, and tax.
Outlook for April
Tennessee is poised to reach the billion-dollar mark in total sports handle in April. The state will need under $100 million in sports betting wagers, a mark that it has never failed to achieve. However, I would not be getting my hopes up for the April handle to continue the bounceback from February.
While we do not have definitive proof about what caused the spike in betting in March, there is an extraordinarily good chance that it was March Madness. Tennessee has rather lax college sports betting laws, and March Madness is one of the biggest sporting events in America. The April handle will have no such event, except for a small spike due to the NFL Draft.
The only real major addition to the betting handle will be baseball in April. Major League Baseball has never been a massive league for sports betting handle, but it will help. Experts estimate a handle that is roughly between the $176.3 million saw in February and the $205.3 million seen in March.
Legal Troubles
March was a fuzzy month for the Tennessee Education Lottery. It attempted to come down strong on Action 24/7 for reportedly accepting fraudulent deposits. There was a long investigation, but by the end of it, Action 24/7 had its licenses suspended.
Action 24/7 took this decision to court, where it swiftly won and received its licenses back as the investigation continues. Following this decision, many worry that the Tennessee Education Lottery lost a lot of its power to regulate. However, there are also those who stress that the TEL was over-stepping with what they did to Action 24/7.
It is rather odd that all of this came up from a sportsbook that is reportedly taking less than 5% of the market in Tennessee. That market share also should dwindle as William Hill and WynnBet step into the market. Hopefully, the legislative branch can work with TEL to better define its role and what it should and can be doing in terms of regulation.
