Sports
Mobile sports betting in Louisiana generates $2.2M in taxes for February
Louisiana collected more than $2.2 million in taxes for the first full month of mobile sports betting in February, more than a half-million dollars higher than retail sports betting through four months.
Data from the Louisiana Gaming Control Board showed the state’s six online sports betting platforms took in $211 million in bets for February, resulting in net proceeds of $16.6 million and $2.2 million in taxes paid to the state.
Mobile sports betting in Louisiana launched Jan. 28 and online platforms handled $40.4 million in wagers during the last four days of the month, though tax deductions for promotional wagers resulted in zero tax collections for January. Without the deductions, the bets would have generated $400,000 in taxes, according to the data.
Louisiana’s mobile sportsbooks have written $251.5 million in wagers since the platforms went live, generating $7.6 million in net proceeds and $2.2 million in taxes.
The state’s 13 retail sports betting sites, meanwhile, took in about $27.4 million in wagers in February, resulting in $642,663 in net proceeds and $14,187 in taxes paid. Those figures are a significant drop from January, when retail sites took in $49.2 million in wagers for net proceeds of $5.3 million and $533,259 in taxes collected.
Since retail sports betting began in November, retail sports books have handled about $144 million in wagers, producing $16 million in net proceeds and $1.6 million in taxes paid to Louisiana.
Retail sports betting is taxed at a 10% rate and mobile sports betting is taxed at 15%. Sixty percent of the tax collections go to the state general fund, 25% to early education, 12% to participating parishes, 2% to gambling addiction programs, and 1% to a sports wagering purse fund for horse racing, Saturday Down South reports.
Football was the most popular sport for mobile sports betting last month, which featured the biggest betting event of the year with the Super Bowl. Net proceeds for football totaled $9.8 million, followed by $5 million in net proceeds from basketball, $4.4 million from parlay bets, $1.3 million from “other” and $183,084 from baseball.
It was a similar situation with retail sports betting, which posted a loss of nearly $700,000 from football, $647,128 in net proceeds from parlay bets, $492,568 from basketball, $143,049 from “other,” $46,740 from soccer and $9,493 from baseball.
Overall, sports betting in Louisiana has generated $395.5 million in wagers, $23.6 million in net proceeds and nearly $3.9 million in taxes since the start of November.
In comparison, Louisiana’s four traditional gaming sectors – video gaming, riverboat casinos, a land-based casino and racinos – took in $268 million in revenue for February, about $15 million more than the month before.
The February figures represented a 31% increase for traditional gaming over the $204.7 million reported a year ago, according to data from the Louisiana Gaming Control Board cited by Top US Casinos.
This article was originally posted on Mobile sports betting in Louisiana generates $2.2M in taxes for February
