A multiyear battle to legalize and launch Missouri sports betting is finally over as the market launched at midnight on Monday morning.
The Missouri Gaming Commission licensed 10 sportsbooks to launch on day one, though Underdog made a last-minute decision to pull out of the market and launch sports predictions in the state instead.
Missouri is the 32nd U.S. jurisdiction with online sports betting.
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Missouri sports betting brands
With Underdog out, there are nine Missouri sportsbooks licensed for launch, including a mix of national and niche brands:
If theScore Bet sounds unfamiliar, it will be run by the same company behind ESPN Bet, Penn Entertainment. Penn and Disney ended their $2 billion partnership for ESPN Bet as market share was not hitting the goals either side expected.
Circa is another brand that may not be known to everyone but is highly respected in the betting world. The Las Vegas-based sportsbook does not have as wide a betting menu as some other operators but accepts action from everyone at transparent limits.
Circa won one of the two untethered licenses in Missouri along with DraftKings, edging out FanDuel in the three-applicant race.
Not just for Missouri residents
The launch of legal betting in Missouri may reverse a more than five-year trend of residents in the St. Louis area to leave the state and head to Illinois to place their bets.
Illinois recently added a per-bet fee to every online bet placed in the state. Half of the state’s operators chose to pass that fee on to the bettor with the other half setting higher minimum bets.
Circa, for example, raised its minimum to $10 in Illinois. DraftKings and FanDuel, the two operators affected the most by the new fee, passed the charge to bettors, meaning it will be cheaper to place bets in Missouri than it is in Illinois.
The per-bet tax has already had an impact on the market since it launched in July. Operators saw total bets placed fall 15% to 30.6 million in September compared to the prior year
How much will Missouri benefit?
The state of Missouri is taxing its licensed sportsbooks 10% of net revenue, a figure overwhelmingly seen as operator-friendly in the era of rising gaming taxes.
At maturity, the state could see more than $4.6 billion in annual handle, leading to more than $500 million in gross revenue. Operators can then deduct promotional costs from taxable revenue, which would cut that tax rate by about a third, according to LSR Data Analyst Eric Ramsey.
That puts a mature annual tax estimate around $35 million, according to Ramsey.
Long road to Missouri sports betting
Sports betting legislation stalled year after year in Missouri thanks to one man: former Sen. Denny Hoskins.
Hoskins routinely tried to tie sports betting to a larger gaming expansion bill that included video lottery terminals, something the commercial casino industry in Missouri did not want after seeing slot routes eat away at Illinois casino revenue just next door.
Ultimately, sports betting came down to a state referendum that passed by fewer than 4,000 votes with 50.05% support. Stakeholders and regulators were hoping to see the market launched by this summer, but Hoskins, now as secretary of state, denied emergency rules, adding months to the process.
The state gaming commission eventually decided on Dec. 1 as the launch date, which was the latest date allowed by law.
