Americans are set to bet billions on the NCAA Tournament. Among the key headlines in the gaming space this week was the fact that March Madness is set to bring in billions of sports betting handle in the regulated market. Go figure. Apparently a lot of bettors like the Madness and betting on the NCAAB odds. We'll start there as we recap the weekly key headlines in online gaming:
Americans Betting Billions On March Madness
The March Madness craze in American hasn’t slowed down at all over the years. It was just reported by the American Gaming Association that approximately 68 million adults in the United States are planning to wager on the NCAA tournament. That approximation also reported that a whopping estimate of $15.5 billion will be coming in over wagers on it. This large total could be contributed to the fact that 30 states now have some form of legalized sports betting.
The American Gaming Association President Bill Miller said, “March Madness is one of the best traditions in American sports, and America’s most wagered-on competition.” There’s been more bracket contests and other ways to gamble on the tournament than ever before as well.
Since the last time March Madness came around, Ohio, Massachusetts, and Kansas have all legalized their sports betting markets. Maryland has joined in on the fun with their mobile sports betting market as well. These three additional states are likely to have contributed in a large way to how many adults plan on betting. It sure makes it a lot more fun in those states to be tracking the tourney, college basketball power rankings, the buzzer beaters, brackets being busted and a lot more.
Borgata In Atlantic City Announced Large Hotel Project
Residents near or in Atlantic City could be in for some good news. It was just announced that the Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa will be rebranding as well as redesigning The Water Club. The project is going to cost them a whopping $55 million in total and will renovate over 700 hotel rooms. The property is currently listed as having around 2,800 rooms in total.
The remodeled rooms are expected to be made available to the public sometime in early April. Memorial Day weekend has been the expectation for the completion of this redesign. The main reason for all of this to be happening is to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the casino-hotel in the state.
Fans shouldn’t expect any big changes to the casino property though. There weren’t any plans to renovate the casino, and it doesn’t look like any are coming anytime soon. The Borgata is a 160,000 square-foot property with 180 table games and nearly 4,000 slot machines for people to choose from.
Kentucky Has Banned Unregulated Skill Games
The governor of Kentucky Andy Beshear has officially signed a law to ban all unregulated skill games across the state. Illegal gambling has been an issue for quite some time, and the decision to make this bill a reality was deemed a “milestone victory” by the American Gaming Association. After all, Kentucky is the very first state to pass legislation of this type, banning all unregulated gambling machines.
The AGA stated last year that Americans gambled away $511 billion on unregulated machines and illegal sportsbooks. Because of this, state governments missed out on roughly $13 billion in tax revenue. The AGA also reported that they believe there are over 580,000 unregulated machines spread across the country right now.
To put this into perspective, it’s anticipated that 870,000 regulated slot machines reside in the United States alone. This bill is hoping to have an impact on that number and help clean up these illegal acts.
