In an unprecedented analysis of the upcoming NCAA March Madness 2024, the online marketplace intelligence specialists, Yield Sec, forecast an anticipated $2.5 billion in legal bets, in line with estimates by the American Gaming Association (AGA) and Eilers & Krejcik Gaming (EKG), will be dwarfed by an estimated $4.20 billion to be wagered through illegal channels, making for a market share division of 63% in favor of illegal gambling operators in the US.
Key predictions March Madness 2024:
- Total March Madness predicted handle of $6.70 billion.
- 63% of March Madness associated bets will be illegal and amount to a predicted $4,204,199,382 (Handle or value of bets placed).
- 37% of March Madness associated bets will be legal and amount to a predicted $2,495,719,952 (Handle or value of bets placed).
- There are 860 illegal operators actively targeting the US – 349 are focused upon illegal sports betting
- 84% of U.S.-facing affiliates promote illegal operators.
- 41% of U.S.-facing affiliates promote both legal and illegal operators.
- 2 offshore jurisdictions host more illegal U.S.-targeting operators than the total number of legal operators in the US.
- The leading illegal operator in the U.S. holds a larger market share than the top 3 U.S. legal brands combined.
This year’s March Madness not only signifies a cultural phenomenon that captivates millions across the United States but also highlights an expanding issue within the gambling industry. Despite the growing availability of online gambling and the ongoing legalization efforts across several states, including North Carolina, the black market continues to hold a formidable influence. This has been attributed to the historical prohibition of online gambling and the presently inconsistent legal framework across the United States, with jurisdictions like California and Georgia still “officially” prohibited from offering any form of legal online sports betting or gaming, leaving local consumers completely beholden to illegal offerings across search, social and the digital conversations and ads.
Yield Sec’s analysis underscores the sophisticated strategies employed by illegal gambling operators to engage audiences, particularly during such high-profile events as the NCAA tournaments. These operations utilize the widespread conversations surrounding March Madness on social media platforms to infiltrate and exploit the collective excitement, offering enticing prop bets and cross-promotional tactics that legal entities cannot match. Yield Sec’s platform consistently detects the cross-sell strategies employed by illegal operators – “if you lost on sports, you could win in the casino” being a consistent message. These entities channel users from major events like March Madness to illicit online casinos, enticing them with cash incentives following losses on bets placed on hoops betting, and allowing benefits such as free spins on slots and free hands of blackjack in the casino.
Ismail Vali, founder and CEO of Yield Sec, shares his insight on the matter: “March Madness is not just a testament to America’s love of college basketball but also a litmus test for the integrity of sports betting. Our predictions shed light on the enduring challenge posed by illegal gambling operations. As they continue to leverage the cultural magnetism of such events, it is imperative for stakeholders to recognize and address the sophisticated strategies these illicit entities employ to entrench their presence, funnel cash away from the legitimate industry, steal taxation and responsible gaming funding, and endanger vulnerable players including children.”
As North Carolina and other states venture into the legal betting space, the dynamics of the gambling industry continue to evolve. Yield Sec’s analysis aims to equip policymakers, regulators, and legal industry operators with critical insights to navigate and mitigate the impact of illegal gambling activities and move the needle against crime, by monitoring, policing and enforcing the total online marketplace.
About Yield Sec:
Yield Sec is a technical intelligence platform that helps monitor, police, enforce, and optimize the total marketplace for legal stakeholder clients across online betting, gaming, and lottery activity. The innovative technology, processes and team behind Yield Sec produce data, analysis and recommended actions that help support their legal stakeholder clients to deliver optimized online futures which also benefit the ecosystem of commerce, community and consumers. When consumers want to bet on sports, casino or lottery online, they should find fair, safe and legal online betting and gambling in every regulated marketplace. Today, many of the sites and apps that consumers find are not legal, licensed or safe. Yield Sec’s mission and work for clients helps to change this status quo and move the needle against crime and towards legal business that benefits local commerce and communities.
Methodology
- Monitoring: Our technical platform scours the internet for relevant betting and gaming keywords and phrases to find all instances of commercial and referral gambling content, traffic, audience, advertising popularity and more.
- Reporting: Content is analysed, categorized and classified into legal and illegal groups, at the top level, and into splits by sports, product, event and more.
- Prioritizing: Once separated into what comes from legal operators and what comes from illegal entrants, the platform uses AI, machine learning and expert human intervention to rank, order and value threats to the individual stakeholder, and the ecosystem overall. The Yield Sec Matrix prioritizes these threats to revenue, market share, player and audience protection, compliance, responsible gaming and potential taxation at the State and National level, based upon the calendar and events cycle. Content featuring advertising for illegal Super Bowl bets in late January in a US State then, is a far higher priority than content pushing illegal Pai Gow Poker in any US State at any time of year.
- Enforcing: Prioritization presents a detailed view of what content needs to be controlled and remedied at the legal operator level (non-compliant advertising from referral partners, for example), and what content needs to be cleared and removed from illegal operators, period. To facilitate removals of illegal content, Yield Sec works alongside media partners, regulators and law enforcement across search, social and digital media platforms which supply the “oxygen” of advertising, availability and destinations.
Yasmine Scott
PR Director | Tassles
Mob: +44(0)7464819439
