Rhode Island is the least populous state in the country, but it’s one of only a handful of states with legal online casino gambling. The Rhode Island Lottery recently announced revenue figures from the first month of operation, and the numbers are in line with the small population.
Online casinos first went live back on March 5th, and so the March report does not outline an entire month of gaming action. Bally’s Corp was behind the launch of online casinos, and the report shows that the company made $1.2 million in revenue.
Commercial gaming was also included in the report, and the in-person casinos in the state saw a huge jump in revenue as well. The lack of competition in Rhode Island will ultimately hurt the overall numbers, but this was viewed as a highly-successful first month of competition.
A Deeper Dive
The Rhode Island Lottery didn’t give too many specific details in the monthly report, but more information could come as the industry develops. This report did highlight the disparity between online slots and table games, and it was the slot machines that brought in more than ¾ of the total revenue.
Table games actually brought in more wagering action, but those games were only able to win Bally’s $238,641. Online slots are typically how casinos make money, and those games brought in $971,906 during the month of March.
Revenue projections suggest that Bally’s Corp could ultimately see an average of $5 million in monthly revenue, but it could take some time to get to that point. That would put the state in line with Delaware in terms of per capita revenue.
Delaware is also going to be the state that Rhode Island should be competing with as they can’t keep up with the other five states with online casinos. West Virginia posted an online casino revenue of $20.7 million, but the numbers only went up from there.
To show the massive disparity between the leaders and Rhode Island, The top three online casino markets combined for more than $645 million during the month of March. Even though the games and options are the same in Rhode Island, there just won’t be enough players that are accessing Bally’s Corp and the online casinos.
Other Gaming Industries
As mentioned earlier in the article, the two in-person casinos in Rhode Island actually saw a huge boost once the online casinos were switched on. That has been a trend in other states as well, even though many states worry about iGaming hurting commercial revenue.
Bally’s Tiverton and Bally’s Twin River combined for $48.7 million in revenue for the month of March, setting a new record during this fiscal year. While the casino revenue was high in-person, that was not the case when it came to retail sports betting.
The total sports betting handle and revenue for March actually saw a huge jump from the February numbers but that was expected when looking at the sports calendar.
