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New Jersey Gaming Enforcement Releases Online Gambling Numbers

New Jersey Gaming Enforcement Releases Online Gambling Numbers

Added: January 15, 2014

Six weeks have passed since regulated online gambling went live in the American state of New Jersey. It covered both poker and casino products. On Tuesday January 14 the New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement released the statistics for these six weeks in its report on Atlantic City gambling performance. The online gambling industry had been waiting for these numbers.

The total revenue generated from online gambling in the first six weeks was $8.4 million. The prediction was over $10 million and this shortfall of about $2 million was disappointing. 40% of this revenue went to online poker and 60% to online and mobile casino gambling. The best performing operator was the MGM-Boyd-Bwin partnership under the Borgata brand with $3.75 million in revenues, $1.9 million from poker and $1.8 million from casino. Caesars Interactive-888 was next with almost $2.4 million in revenues, $1.2 million from poker and $1.17 million from casino. The other operators in this market are Trump Taj Mahal - Ultimate Gaming, Tropicana – Gamesys, Trump Plaza – Betfair and Golden Nugget. The New Jersey regulator had earlier reported that 150,000 online gambling accounts had been opened. This number was not updated.

It is expected that the revenues will increase in the coming weeks for several reasons. The marketing plans put in motion by the big operators will start having effect, more operators will become fully functional with their complete product range, the New Jersey public will become more familiar and comfortable with the set up and the systemic teething problems will be eliminated.

Keith Smith, president of Boyd Gaming, commented on the results. He said, “Our network has attracted the largest pool of players in the New Jersey online market, allowing us to offer our customers a wide selection of games and table stakes at all times. This gives our network a significant competitive advantage and positions us for further success.” Smith pointed out that online gaming was complementary, not competitive, to land-based gambling. He said that 60% of online casino customers had not been to the Borgata Casino in over a year, and over 75% of them had visited the land casino less than two times in the past year. Smith cited another statistic to support his claim. In December 2013, on a combined basis, online and land-based poker revenue at Borgata was up more than 40% from land-based play in December 2012.

Online gambling has come at the right time to New Jersey. In 2013, for the first time in 22 years Atlantic City land casino revenue fell below $3 billion.