The rise of regulated sport betting in the United States has been great news for licensed operators such as DraftKings and BetMGM. These companies have seen business boom as Americans of all stripes throw down hundreds of millions of dollars every week on their beloved NFL and college football games. But the sports betting boom has been bad news for a different group – black market bookmakers.
According to a report recently published by GeoComply Solutions, the company responsible for enforcing geo-fencing in almost all of the regulated market, regulated sports betting is squashing the black market. The company bases that claim on the massive amounts of Americans who are wagering in the legal market.
“Preparing for this NFL season has been a process that began before the end of last season, and we expected high volumes, but what we have seen has surprised us nonetheless. The level of demand across new markets, such as Arizona, indicates that consumers have long waited for the option to legally place a sports bet,” said Lindsay Slader, Managing Director of Gaming for GeoComply.
“The data tells a remarkable story about the growth of the industry in a short period of time. This success is a credit to all our clients and state regulators, who have worked tirelessly to prepare for the start of the new NFL season,” she added.
GeoComply says there were 58.2 geolocation transactions between September 9 and 12 across 18 states and the District of Columbia. This represents a 126 percent increase over the previous year and, according to GeoComply, is enough to snuff out almost all black market sports betting.