Six sports betting bills have been introduced in the Connecticut House, seeking to alter the state’s online sports betting landscape.
Rep. Tony Scott has introduced five bills and is looking to usher in various changes to sports wagering. A breakdown of the bills is as follows:
HB 5663: The bill, titled “An Act concerning sports wagering on Connecticut Intercollegiate Teams,” proposes legalizing wagering on a sporting event in which one or more participants is a Connecticut intercollegiate team. Current legislation only permits wagering on CT teams when participating in tournaments.
HB 5664: Dubbed “An Act establishing a maximum hold percentage for sports wagering,” the bill looks to cap the hold operators can generate on online sports wagering activity. The bill does not propose a number, but CT sportsbooks have generated a 10.4% hold of $5.6 billion handle.
Given that revenue is reported monthly, the bill does not provide information about whether the legislation would cap monthly hold or apply it over a more extended period. Hold tends to fluctuate depending on sporting results, impacting operator results, and HB 5664 is likely to face significant opposition from commercial entities.
HB 5665: HB 5665 reads, “An Act establishing consumer opt-outs for sports wagering.” It seeks to require sports betting operators to allow customers to opt out of seeing specific sports, events, and types of wagers.
HB 5778: Scott also proposes in HB 5778 that all sports offered by operators offer two-way markets.
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HB 5779: The last of Scott’s proposed changes offers player protection, similar to the palpable error rule commonly used in regulated European markets. It reads: “to provide that a sports wagering retailer shall, before the start of any sporting event for which such retailer accepts any sports wagering and discovers any error, (1) correct such error, (2) cancel any sports wagering impacted by such error, and (3) fully refund all patrons impacted by such error.
The bills mentioned above have been referred to the Connecticut General Law Committee.
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Rep. Christopher Rosario also introduced HB 6051, “An Act authorizing and providing for regulating in-flight sports wagering.”
Rosario’s proposed legislation would authorize and regulate in-flight sports betting on flights scheduled to originate or end in Connecticut. It also suggests that one percent of all revenue generated by in-flight wagering would be allocated to CT’s public education in rural and urban school districts.
Currently, gambling on commercial aircraft is not permitted on a federal level.
The introduction of CT Bill HB 6051 comes soon after Delta Airlines announced a partnership with DraftKings, which will see the latter provide in-game entertainment through games. The airline has been careful to distance itself from saying it offers in-flight wagering, commenting in a press release, “While specific details on the agreement and the type of DraftKings offerings coming to Delta Sync will be shared when they’re finalized, the ability to gamble is not currently part of that exploration.”
