New Jersey’s regulated online gambling market generated revenue of $9.5m in June, down 9.5% ($1m) from May’s revenue total. That marks the third straight month of online gambling revenue decline since the market apparently peaked at $11.9m in March. (How’s that quote go? Once is a fluke, twice is a coincidence, three times is a trend.) June’s online casino revenue fell 8.5% ($700k) to $7.5m while the poker vertical fell 13% ($300k) to $2m.
As usual, the Borgata/Bwin.party online tandem ruled the roost with $3.47m in revenue, although that was down 12.5% ($500k) from the previous month. The Borgata/Bwin casino vertical dipped over 14% ($400k) to $2.4m while poker shed nearly 11% to to $1.07m. The Caesars Interactive New Jersey sites earned $2.6m in June, down about 7% from May. Caesars’ casino revenue dipped $100k to $1.65m while poker was down about $60k to $942k. The Tropicana’s Gamesys-powered casino-only site maintained its third place finish but still shed around 8% to $1.73m.
The Golden Nugget’s casino-only site was again the only monthly gainer, rising 5% to just under $711k. The Nugget’s gains allowed it to leapfrog the Trump Plaza/Betfair combo, which saw its online casino revenue fall over one-quarter to $503k. The BetfairCasino site suffered similar shrinkage in May and is now down nearly half from its $926k peak in April. On Friday, the struggling Plaza announced it would likely shut its doors for good in September, prompting questions about BetfairCasino’s future. The Trump Taj Mahal/Ultimate Gaming combo earned $496k in June, all but $30k via its casino vertical, about on par with its earnings the previous month.
The month wasn’t a total loss, as the total number of online accounts registered since the market opened in November increased 7.8% to 379k. However, it’s clear that the newbies aren’t keeping pace with the dropouts. For the year to date, online gambling has brought in $63m for New Jersey’s regulated operators. Two-thirds ($42.5m) of this total has been earned by Borgata/Bwin and Caesars, while those two accounted for 97.5% of all online poker revenue in the first half of 2014.
