A fresh round of records have been enjoyed across Virginia, with sportsbooks toppling the previous best performance by more than 13 per cent and edging ever closer to the $500m mark.
Bettors poured $485.5m in wagers into Virginia’s sports betting entities in January, surpassing the previous record of $427.3m that was produced in October.
In addition to being up 13.8 per cent from $426.6m month-on-month, the daily wagering average also grew to $15.7m per day over the 31 days of January from $13.8m through December.
“Five weekends of football, which included an extra week of regular season football and an expanded NFL playoffs, were unquestionably a boon for sportsbooks in January,” said Dann Stupp, lead analyst for PlayVirginia.
“Sportsbooks will begin to slow down after March Madness. But the industry made a giant leap forward during the football season, and that has it on solid footing for the year ahead.”
Furthermore, Sportsbooks won $39.1m in gross revenue, a second-best for Virginia and up from $31.5m in December.
After accounting for $16.9m in promotional spending and $4m in other deductions, sportsbooks produced $18.2m in taxable revenue that yielded $2.9m in state taxes.
The commonwealth is still too young for full-month, year-over year comparisons, however, betting volume has more than doubled since Virginia launched sports betting on January 21, 2021.
During the market’s first 11 days sportsbooks generated $5.4m in wagers per day, generating $3.6m in revenue on $58.9m in wagers.
“Virginia’s sportsbooks still have significant room for growth,” said Eric Ramsey, an analyst for the PlayUSA. “Over the last five months, operators have continued to expand their reach to new customers.
“But just as important, individual bettors are wagering more than a year ago as they become more familiar with the myriad products online sportsbooks are offering.
