One month after the Pennsylvania online casino gaming vertical and several operators, including the top three, hit record revenue in March, the enterprise saw revenue decline 7.4% month-over-month in April.
Still, the $134.5 million that online casinos in PA generated made April the second-highest month for revenue overall, and the vertical was up a healthy 22% year-over-year ($110.2 million), data from the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board (PGCB) show.
Revenue hit a record $145.3 million in March. For now, March 2023 remains the first month with record revenue since December 2022, when the vertical grossed $131.9 million.
Rivers Operators Slip, But Still in Third
Operators on the Hollywood, Valley Forge, and Rivers-Philadelphia casinos licenses continued to dominate the vertical and expanded their combined market share to 85.8% in April, up from 85.5% in March, PGCB data show.
Hollywood Casino — whose online partners are Barstool, BetMGM Casino PA, DraftKings Casino PA, and Hollywood Casino PA — had $58.1 million of revenue in April, down 6.2% from the record $61.9 million they made in March. The group — which has led the vertical since December 2020, a stretch of 29 consecutive months — was up 29.2% year-over-year ($45 million).
Valley Forge, partnered with FanDuel Casino PA and Stardust Casino, saw revenue slip 1.9% month-over-month to $31.2 million in April, compared to a record $31.8 million in March. But Valley Forge was up 45.2% year-over-year ($21.5 million), strengthening its grip on second place. It bested operators on the Rivers license for the fourth month.
Rivers was also coming off a record month in March, but the partners on the Rivers license — BetRivers Casino PA, Borgata Casino PA, and SugarHouse Casino PA — saw revenue tumble 14.5% to land at $26 million in April, off from the $30.4 million gem the operators posted in March. The Rivers group was also down 9.5% from the year-ago month ($28.7 million).
A Game of Inches for PokerStars, Wind Creek
On the Mount Airy Casino license, PokerStars Casino was the only operator not to lose revenue in April. But it didn’t bring in that much more — only $154. The operator has also been essentially flat for three months running.
Wind Creek Casino came just short of setting another record. After grossing a record $2.1 million in March, the operator managed to do it again in April — but last month was still $2,978 short of its March record, PGCB data show. Wind Creek has continued to grow steadily since its launch in July 2020.
Caesars Casino PA had its third-best month for revenue in April, with $4 million. The operator on the Harrah’s Philadelphia Casino and Racetrack license wasn’t among the operators to break a record in March — they did it one month earlier, hitting $4.5 million in February.
The PGCB approved an application by Bally Casino to become the state’s only Qualified Gaming Entity (QGE) in February. Under the state’s gaming law, QGEs are exempt from partnering with a land-based casino.
Bally Casino PA has not announced a launch date yet. When it does, it will become the 19th online casino in PA.
