Missouri Sports Betting Ballot Measure Approved By Voters
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Missouri voters approved legal mobile and retail sports betting wagering, allowing controlled books to take bets next year.
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The sports betting wagering ballot measure gone by a slim majority early Wednesday morning after more than 2.9 million votes were counted.
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Seven of the 8 states surrounding Missouri permit mobile or retail sportsbooks. That includes Kansas and Illinois, which split the Kansas City and St. Louis city locations with Missouri, respectively.
Missouri is the 39th state to authorize legal sportsbooks and the 31st to green light statewide mobile sports betting. It is the only state to approve sports betting wagering this year.
" Missouri has a few of the very best sports betting fans on the planet and they appeared huge for their favorite teams on Election Day," Bill DeWitt III, president of the St. Louis Cardinals, stated in a statement. "On behalf of all six of Missouri's professional sports betting franchises, we wish to thank the Missouri citizens who made their voices heard by approving Amendment 2. This historic vote makes Missouri the 39th state to legislate sports betting and ensures we no longer lose valuable tax profits to our surrounding states. Most significantly, the passage of Amendment 2 implies a new, dedicated, irreversible financing stream for Missouri class."
Missouri sports betting wagering next steps
Voter approval indicates as much as 14 mobile sportsbooks could start accepting bets next year. It is unlikely all 14 available licenses are used.
DraftKings and FanDuel financed nearly every dollar of the "yes" project and will undoubtedly apply to take bets in the Show Me State. They will likely each pursue the two "untethered" licenses readily available without having to partner with a Missouri brick-and-mortar casino or sports betting group (and pay an accompanying cost).
Six licenses are offered to each Missouri casino operator, respectively. Caesars, regardless of opposing the tally measure, will likely use its license to release the Caesars mobile sportsbook. Penn Entertainment, which manages ESPN Bet, and Bally's (Bally Bet) will likewise likely release their particular books.
The other 3 operators are Boyd Gaming, Century Casino, and Affinity Interactive. It remains unclear if they will launch mobile sportsbooks.
The staying 6 licenses are booked for each of the major expert sports betting teams that play home video games in Missouri: MLB's Kansas City Royals and Cardinals, the NFL's Kansas City Chiefs, NHL's St. Louis Blues, MLS' St. Louis City SC and the NWSL's Kansas City Current. The sports betting organizations were among the most popular proponents of the ballot step.
In addition to DraftKings, FanDuel and Caesars, Missouri bettors should anticipate other prominent nationwide brands including BetMGM, bet365, BetRivers and Fanatics to seek market gain access to.
Launch probability tiers IF Missouri citizens approve sports betting wagering:
Guarantees: FanDuel, DraftKings
Locks: BetMGM, Bally Bet
Highly likely: Fanatics, bet365, ESPN BET
Are Already Reside In Illinois, So Yeah(?): BetRivers, Hard Rock, Circa
Opposed Referendum But Still Might: Caesars
Missouri's ballot step enables every Missouri casino to open retail sportsbooks on their respective properties. Most if not all 13 gambling establishments managed by the six gambling establishment operators are anticipated to open in-person sports betting choices such as wagering kiosks and potentially committed, full-service sportsbooks.
The six sports betting teams can also open in-person sportsbooks within or nearby to their respective home playing venues. Missouri will join Illinois, Maryland, Arizona, Connecticut, and Washington, D.C. amongst jurisdictions that allow in-stadium retail sportsbooks.
The language around the ballot procedure needs the first licensed sportsbooks to begin accepting wagers by Dec. 1, 2025. Operators will likely deal with regulators to go live before kick-off of the fall 2025 football season, perennially books' most profitable time of the sports betting calendar.
Missouri sports betting background
The successful Missouri sports betting campaign comes in spite of millions in funding opposing the measure from among the state's largest gambling stakeholders.
Caesars invested countless dollars to beat the procedure. In a lot of other states that tie online sports betting with a state's brick-and-mortar casinos, an operator is granted a minimum of one license per managed home.
In that scenario in Missouri, would be paid for a minimum of three potential licenses, one for each gambling establishment it manages. Instead, Caesars just has one. In states with the license-per-property model, companies can either open extra internal books or, more frequently, subcontract the license to a competitor that pays an accompanying charge in exchange.
FanDuel and DraftKings, which have approximately two-thirds of U.S. across the country sports betting wagering deal with market share, might potentially have a leg up on their competitors by making the set of untethered licenses. It stays to be seen which 2 books will make these slots, but the language around the ballot procedure would seem to favor the two nationwide market leaders.
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Polling previously in the year revealed the "yes" vote with a slight lead. Support efforts were strengthened by tens of millions invested by DraftKings and FanDuel.
A series of television and radio ads focused on the earnings legal sportsbooks would create for Missouri public education. Opponents, funded largely by Caesars, argued the supporters' ads were misleading and the 10s of countless forecasted dollars raised would have a negligible effect in a state that already spends billions on education annually.