Research firm predicts a new casino future

US casinos of the future will probably offer a wide range of gambling variants that include skill-based slot machines, online gambling, sports betting, fantasy sports and eSports arenas and wagering facilities, the research company Rubin Brown predicts in its new report “Gaming Statistics”, based on statistical data from the industry.

Gaming practice leader Daniel Holmes, told the publication Players Advantage that in 2015, gamblers lost more than $71 billion at commercial and tribal casinos, state-sanctioned online gaming and what RubinBrown calls the “limited-stakes gaming” in the highest total yet for the industry win, and the sixth straight year of growth.

The report attributes the performance to continued organic growth rather than new markets and regional expansion, allied to an expanding job market and lower fuel prices…and it expects the trend to continue.

His findings are supported by new figures from the Center for Gaming Research at University of Nevada, which reports that gambling revenue in 20 states with commercial casinos for January and February this year was up by 4.1 percent from 2015.

Commercial casinos account for about 54 percent of the gambling industry’s revenue, RubinBrown says; tribal casinos contribute 41 percent, with limited-stakes gaming providing 4 percent and the nascent online-gaming market kicking in less than a half-percent.

Holmes is less sanguine about the chances for online poker legalisation in California, due he says to the competing factions there. He says Pennsylvania might be quicker to approve online gambling because it is near two states already offering it (Delaware and New Jersey) and has been “very aggressive and welcoming” to legalised gambling over the past decade.

Skill based slots will be a feature in the future, and have already been approved by regulators in Nevada and New Jersey, and a proposal is being considered by Pennsylvania, he notes.

These and other game and technology developments are driving the gaming industry through a period of change, and operators will have to offer far more than a “row of slots, row of tables and then a buffet at the back.”

The RubinBrown report rabks land gambling cities by revenue, with the top five listed as:

Las Vegas Strip: $6.35 billion

Atlantic City: $2.41 billion

Chicago: $1.97 billion

New York City: $1.39 billion

Detroit: $1.38 billion