Illinois’ Sports Betting Handle in September is $566.5 Million, Per IGB

On Monday, the Illinois Gaming Board reported its total September sports betting handle and as the report suggests, it is $596.5 million. Thanks to these numbers, the national monthly sports handle has reached over $5 billion for the first time in the era known as post-PASPA.

Ten States Reported Record-Breaking Monthly Handles

This milestone did not come as a surprise considering the fact that a total of 10 states reported record-breaking monthly handles. Illinois wasn’t among those 10 states, but its handle in September is its second-best after March when the state reported $633.6 million and became one of four states to have its second-highest monthly handle. After reaching the record-breaking revenue in March, Illinois experienced a dip in numbers in April.

Even more impressive is that the Land of Lincoln is the fourth state to gross over $6 billion in sports handle, along with Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Nevada.

The only state that is yet to reveal its figures is Arizona and without it, the total handle from the District of Columbia and the 22 states where betting is legal reached $5.19 billion and it breezes past the previous record-holder of $4.63 billion in March, largely because of the men’s NCAA basketball.

In September, the popularity of parlay wagering has increased a lot and there was a high-level convergence of the MLB, college football and NFL. To add to that, the number of jurisdictions that accept legal bets is the highest in history.

Illinois Operators Posted a 6.7% Win Rate

The adjusted revenue of Illinois operators for September was just below $40 million with a win rate that was almost the same as August’s – 6.7%. State tax coffers received in receipts was around $6 million and Cook County’s tax receipts alone were $451,911. In 2021, Illinois generated $53.9 million in tax revenue, falling only behind New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

The top mobile operator in the Land of Lincoln remains DraftKings as it is the only platform that has recorded $200 million in sports handle. In September, its sports handle was $231 million; however, some bettors were ahead in a few sports. Since operators cannot set promotional play as “untaxed revenue,” DraftKings paid out $2.4 million more than the $92.5 million that was wagered.

Baseball was the sport that contributed to bettors’ most wins as it came with around $664,000 ahead. Basketball’s win was around $47,000. DraftKings managed to recoup some of its losses thanks to tennis, as it came with a positive rate of $850,000. Parlays were its main revenue driver as it claimed $8 million off $49.8 million that was wagered, equating to a 16.13% win rate.

Illinois has a total of six mobile operators and DraftKings is the clear leader with a 40% market share. FanDuel has 27.2%, BetRivers has 15.3%. Other operators in the state include Barstool, which had a $44.9 million handle and edged PointsBet for the fourth spot. PointsBet’s handle was $41.6 million. Caesars was sixth with an $8.1 million handle, and it was responsible for 1.4% of the online betting handle, which reached $566 million.

FanDuel remains the top earner in the state and extends its record to 10 months as it reported a $16.7 million revenue. The total revenue of BetRivers was around $7.3 million, and it was good enough for the operator to be ranked second, which is the first time it managed to climb this high since October 2020. Even though DraftKings’ handle increased 61.6% month-over-month, its revenue slipped 9.6% from August and reached $6.6 million.

Barstool’s revenue was $3.6 million, PointsBet’s revenue was $3.1 million and Caesars claimed $269,303 as it saw bettors leave and limit the win rate to 3.3%.

Parlays Were FanDuel’s Biggest Contributor

Thanks to parlays, FanDuel managed to remain Illinois’ top revenue generator for so long. September wasn’t any different because parlays contributed to $10.7 million of its profits with a win rate of 22.3%. The interesting part is that its parlay handle was actually lighter than DraftKings’ and it totaled around $48 million.

Parlays contributed to 61.3% of PointsBet’s revenue as it recorded $1.9 million revenue from a total of $9.9 million wagered, which is a 19.3% win rate.

All in all, parlays were responsible for $22.9 million in profits and thus, accounted for 57.2% of the total revenue. Out of the $983.6 million wagered in 2021, parlay revenue exceeded $171 million, which is a 17.4% hold. Moreover, the tax revenue from parlays so far is $25.7 million, which is 47.6% of the total tax revenue in Illinois for 2021.

Most of the hard work on retail sports betting was done by Rivers Casino as it accepted a total of $10.9 million in wagers and crossed the $1 million mark in revenue for the fifth time ever since the first bet was accepted in Illinois (March 2020). Retailers set a record handle, which was $25.8 million, surpassing the record that was set in October 2020 ($24.7 million).

Even though Hollywood Casino in Joliet did not have the Barstool Sportsbook for registering in-person, it nearly outpaced its counterpart in Aurora in handle and its revenue was higher by around $900,000 as it had $164,381. The house’s hold in-person was 9.3% and it resulted in revenue close to $2.4 million. It was also closer to the year-to-date win rate, which was 9.7%.