New Jersey’s November gambling results behind pre-pandemic levels

The post-COVID-19 doldrums continue even though cheerful optimism is trying to replace a bleak outlook. And yet, numbers are the best gauge whether an economic malaise has been fully overturned. In the case of New Jersey’s gambling industry, the pandemic’s lasting impact continues to bite into the bottom lines of gambling companies.

Collectively, Atlantic City’s casinos won nearly 4% more than they did from in-person gamblers compared to 2021, but the results remained suppressed when compared to 2019, the year before COVID-19 swept across the gambling industry and forced shut hundreds of properties. Still, casinos managed to drive around $214.5m from in-person gamblers, or a 3.7% increase year-over-year.

The industry is definitely happy to see its annual performance improve, but there are fresh challenges to address. For one, operating costs for Atlantic City’s casino properties have gone up and are now well ahead of the numbers in 2019. And, when all verticals are factored in, including casinos, racetracks, and Internet partners, the total gaming revenue for the month of November stands at $441.1m, just 0.3% better than November 2021’s $439.6m.

While Internet gambling has been a buoyant sector and, in many cases, a lifeline for ailing land-based properties, there is another issue with the way this sector operates. According to the Casino Association of New Jersey, nearly 70% of the income is forwarded to third parties, such as tech providers and sportsbooks.

This means that the casinos themselves while partnering with operators, are still not generating nearly enough to fully offset the losses incurred during the pandemic. This is also one of the arguments that the association has used to stay the push for the introduction of no-smoking mandates on gaming floors, something that the association expects to significantly suppress performance and revenue, albeit there seems to be sufficient evidence to the contrary.

Internet gaming win for November 2022 was actually making an impressive recovery, with the operations pulling in $146.2m ahead of the $118m posted a year ago, or a 23.9% increase. The first 11 months of the year saw New Jersey generate $1.51bn in total Internet gaming win compared to the $1.23bn posted in the first 11 months of 2021, a 22.5% increase.

Sports wagering though fell off by affair bit, with the gross revenue dropping by 29.9% to $80.4m compared to the $114.8m in November 2021. The total amount of wagers placed in November 2022 stood at $1.1bn.

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