Digital Wager Wire highlights the most important events impacting the domestic and international sports betting and gaming industry each week throughout the year.
Maine Gov Delays Signing Online Casino Bill
A deluge of bills that advanced to Governor Janet Mills’ desk at the end of the legislative session requires further study and could not be adequately studied by the governor within the 10-day window. This includes LD 1164, the iGaming measure approved by both chambers. Because the legislators will be returning in January, the lack of the governor’s signature does not constitute a pocket veto.
However, Mills will have only three days to act once the chambers reconvene, and at that time, she can either sign the bill, veto it, or choose not to sign it, which will make it law.
A statement from her office read, “The Legislature passed a significant number of bills at the end of the session, and the Governor takes seriously her constitutional obligation to thoroughly review all of them and to evaluate their implications on Maine people, Maine businesses, and the Maine economy.
“In order to meet that responsibility, she will continue to review these bills and gather more information, and she looks forward to acting on them at the beginning of the next legislative session,” the statement added.
Should the bill pass, iGaming would be under the purview of the state’s four Wabanaki Nations tribal bands, including the Passamaquoddy Tribe, the Penobscot Nation, the Houlton Band of Maliseet Indians, and the Mi’kmaq Nation.
The tribes in Maine are not allowed to build land-based casinos, only bingo parlors, due to the Maine Indian Claims Settlement Act of 1980, but were granted exclusivity over the state’s mobile sports betting industry, where three of the four tribes partnered with DraftKings while the fourth struck an agreement with Caesars.
Naturally, the tribes support the online gaming measure, and Representative Ambureen Rana, the sponsor of LD 1164, believes they are justly entitled to the monopoly based on their inability to build land-based casinos, an economic lifeline afforded to most tribes in other states.
“Because the Wabanaki Nations have not enjoyed anywhere near the level of economic growth as that of other tribes in this country, they face an ongoing economic crisis,” Rana stated.
Will Penn Say Goodbye to ESPN Bet?
Penn Entertainment, long known as a land-based casino powerhouse, has seen its stock plummet from $128/share in 2021 to where it stands now at $17.55. CEO Jay Snowden has come under fire from the company’s investors for spending hundreds of millions of dollars to access the mobile sports betting industry, currently dominated by FanDuel and DraftKings.
Snowden initially spent $650 million on the Barstool Sports media empire, intending to brand a new entry into the market, Barstool Sportsbook. However, shortly after that deal was completed, Snowden was alerted that Disney-owned ESPN was open to selling the rights to its tag letters to a gaming company for the right to brand a sportsbook with its name.
Snowden pivoted immediately and offered $2 billion over 10 years to create ESPN Bet. However, the catch was that he had to sell Barstool Sports and subsequently dissolve the sportsbook if he wanted to seal the deal with the family-oriented Disney company.
Ultimately, he caved to their demands and sold Barstool Sports, sans the sportsbook, which he dissolved, back to its founder for $1 and the guarantee that Penn would receive 50% of the proceeds from the sale. The founder, Dave Portnoy, has vowed not to sell.
Unfortunately for Snowden and Penn investors, ESPN Bet has done little to move the needle much more than Barstool Sportsbook, capturing an estimated 3% of the market. A public outcry from a major Penn investor, HG Vora, has caused the company to accept two new members of its board who were expressly backed by Vora.
Penn has approximately 18 months to decide whether to opt out of its agreement with ESPN, and many believe they are already pivoting in that direction. However, a second-quarter earnings call in August may give us additional information as to the trajectory of the company.
