Inside Asian Gaming

inside asian gaming October 2015 6 T he sports wagering world is changing fast. Several US states are looking into legalizing sports betting, potentially breaking the last wagering monopoly of Nevada, where the sports book lounge—with TV monitors showing contests in progress and wagering by handheld devices—has become as much a Las Vegas staple as the sequined showgirl. North American sports governing bodies’ solid front of opposition to betting began to crack last November on the New York Times op-ed page when National Basketball Association Commissioner Adam Silver urged regulating and Feature In Focus Ending Macau’s sports betting monopoly could boost revenue and enliven gaming floors By Muhammad Cohen legalizing the estimated $400 billion US illegal betting market. That would bring Uncle Sam into line with Europe where sports betting is bigger and utterly ubiquitous, with major wagering brands dominating the sideline advertising and even blazoned across player kit. Daily fantasy sports, booming on websites such as DraftKings and FanDuel, built $1 billion valuations, attracting investors such as Disney and Fox Sports, mainstream website imitators such as Yahoo, sports leagues as sponsors and sports fans by the millions forking out entry fees equivalent to Nevada’s sports betting handle in a pursuit that, but for a loophole in US law, would be called proposition betting. The revolution in sports wagering stretches far beyond the US. The digital age has made betting online and by phone app possible as well as introducing new ranges of wagering. In-running (or in- game) betting with odds calculated with the real-time precision of financial trading and provided by the likes of investment bank Cantor Fitzgerald’s CG Technology, has revolutionized the sports wagering menu and is estimated to account for 75% of the betting handle. eSports, featuring professionals playing combat games such as Defense of the Ancients and League of Legends, are parlaying their massive viewership—League of Legends 2014 Finals had 30 million global viewers, better numbers than this year’s NBA Finals did on US TV—into conventional and fantasy betting, with mainline Betting Slip