The data reveals that the latest handle figures have taken Arizona’s generated funds from wagers to $3bn over the first six months of operation.
Analysts at PlayAZ note the sizeable impact the Super Bowl had on keeping business brisk at Arizona’s sportsbooks, which accounted for a large portion of the $500m taken during February.
Bettors placed an average of $17.6m in wagers per day over February, down from an $18.2m per day average in January.
Despite the success of the Super Bowl, February marked the first month-over-month decline in sports betting since Arizona became a live market, a 13% dip from the record $563.7m sportsbooks collected in wagers this January.
PlayAZ has tempered any concern over February marking the start of a negative market trend, though, citing the shortness of the month — in which only one NFL game was played — as the key reason for the modest downtick in revenue figures.
“Arizona is following a similar pattern to more mature markets”, claimed PlayUSA’s Eric Ramsey.
“As big a single event as the Super Bowl is, it can’t match a month like January that had five full weekends of football games. US sports betting has predictable seasonal ebbs and flows that generally follow the football season, with a one-month exception in March because of the NCAA Tournament.”
The NCAA Tournament, commonly referred to as March Madness, helped sportsbooks win $25.6m in gross revenue from bets placed in March.
Although the full data from March is yet to come in, FanDuel sits in a dominant position at the head of Arizona’s market, holding off DraftKings to take $142.4m in online wagers across February.
FanDuel’s total wagers stood at $149.8m; just $7.4m was taken from sources other than online sports betting.
This highlights the dominance of the online space in Arizona; in fact, 99.3% of February’s statewide handle is accounted for through online sportsbooks.
