William Hill and Wynn Sports join FanDuel, BetMGM, DraftKings and Tennessee Action 24/7 as the latest online sportsbooks approved for license in Tennessee.
Tennessee’s fledgling sports betting industry which is exclusively online saw $312.3 million in gross wagers in its first two months of operation (November and December of 2020). This brought in $5.4 million in privilege taxes and both January and February will likely see similar tax revenues thanks to Super Bowl LV.
However, despite the fact that the 55th Super Bowl is expected to generate as much as $500 million in bets, Neither William Hill nor Wynn Sports’ sportsbook will be up and running in time.
According to Associated Press reports, Lottery CEO Rebecca Hargrove revealed that one of the operators had servers located close to where a bomb was detonated in Nashville over Christmas.
Another operator, Churchill Downs under the name of BetAmerica, has also recently received a license. However, Churchill Downs has previously stated that BetAmerica will rebrand as TwinSpires and has yet to begin operations within the state.
Tennessee joined the wave of states passing sports betting legislation in Spring of 2019 despite the fact that Republican Governor Bill Lee refused to sign the bill into law. However, with a majority of lawmakers in favor of a regulated sports betting industry, the law came into effect in the summer of 2019. Since then, the state lottery is responsible for vetting operators, issuing licenses, and regulating the industry.
Image credit: Erik Drost / CC BY 2.0
London based reporter covering all aspects of the global regulated and unregulated land-based and online gambling industry - including business news, sports-betting, casinos, poker & regulation