Since the Supreme Court puts its ok on the legalization of sports betting in the United States this once sleepy corner of the gambling world has experienced something of boom. Businesses of all stripes are doing whatever they can to get in on the action; businesses like TD Ameritrade, one the country’s largest discount brokerage houses.
In recent interview with Business Insider (subscription required) the company’s chief information officer, Vijay Sankaran spoke at length about his company’s desire to expand into the world of sports betting and sports analytics. Though he was light on specifics, Sankaran said, “We do feel like there are interesting analogs in applying market constructs to fantasy-sports-type things.”
The union of sports betting and high finance is hardly unprecedented in the United States and dates back to the days when real sports betting was only legal in Nevada. In fact, Cantor Fitzgerald, a New York financial services firm has long run sportsbook operations for several Nevada casinos.
Sankaran didn’t explicitly suggest that TD Ameritrade would try to handle day-to-day operations in any casino, but rather pointed the way towards a future that focused on analytics and fantasy sports. This too is not necessarily unheard of, remember both DraftKings and FanDuel have expanded from fantasy sports to actually running land-based sportsbooks.
Of course the real motivation behind this proposed move is revenue; the bottom line as Sankaran explained saying, “We expect this decision to have a revenue impact of approximately $220 million-$240 million per quarter, or approximately 15-16 percent of net revenues, based on June Quarter fiscal 2019 revenue.”
Don’t be surprised to see other financial services firms follow TD Ameritrade’s lead into the world of sports betting.