EKG LINE: ARE CASINO GAMES THE NEXT FRONTIER FOR KALSHI?
A weekly newsletter with gambling industry insights from the Sports Betting & Emerging Verticals team at Eilers & Krejcik Gaming
1. ARE CASINO GAMES THE NEXT FRONTIER FOR KALSHI?
As Kalshi continues growing its sports offering, we wonder whether the company is considering another boundary-pushing expansion—a casino-like product.
The opportunity is hard to ignore: we size U.S. iCasino at a ~$100bn 50-state GGR TAM, yet only ~12% of adults have access today (vs. ~62% for OSB).
That asymmetry makes casino look like a massive opportunity but the potential pushback from regulators, courts, and Congress could be significant.
What might a casino-style game look like on Kalshi et al? One step could be quick-resolution markets on real-world events such as the Bitcoin price.
Crypto casinos like Rollbit (pictured below) offer these markets with a crash-game style interface and up to 1000x leverage.
Kalshi already offers hourly markets on economic indicators (shown below)—as will the forthcoming product from FanDuel/CME group.
As such, it might not be a huge leap to move to shorter timeframe resolutions—and further ramp up the pressure on OSB operators.
2. PODCAST: WILL THE UK MARKET BE TAXED INTO OBLIVION?
Host Brad Allen is joined by Alun Bowden and former Evoke chief strategy officer Vaughan Lewis to discuss:
Whether the UK will avoid a doomsday scenario of 50% tax on online casino
How big the UK black market could get
Listen to the episode here.
3. TRENDING UP / TRENDING DOWN
Trending up: Crypto gambling in the U.S. Rush Street Interactive has partnered with crypto payment provider BurraPay to allow BetRivers customers to fund their accounts with digital currency. The crypto funding is being rolled out on a market-by-market basis, pending regulatory approvals.
Trending down: $DKNG. DraftKings stock is down 23% in the last month. The company was this week subject to a short report from Spruce Capital, arguing that investors were underestimating the threat from prediction markets. DraftKings CEO Jason Robins said those fears were overblown this week at G2E, explaining: “I just don’t see a world where it’s not clear to the customer that the sportsbook is just a vastly stronger experience. I’m not trying to be dismissive but I don’t really see that. I don’t.”
4. CHART OF THE WEEK: FANATICS KEEPS PUSHING ON ONLINE CASINO
The chart above, taken from our latest Online Casino Market Monitor, shows promo: NGR ratios for online casino operators over the past two years.
The standout is Fanatics, with top of market promo levels that are clearly having an impact. Fanatics was the fastest-growing brand in the market (T3M GGR +296% y/y), albeit still to relatively small levels (3.8% GGR share for Jun-August.
It is backing its recently-launched standalone app—which showed promise but with pitfalls in our early testing—with differentiated promos (e.g., $25k FanCash Jackpot).