Wanna Bet?

🏀 The first full round of March Madness starts just after noon ET today – and the US is ready to gamble. An estimated 45 million Americans will combine to bet over $3 billion on this year’s men’s tournament, according to the American Gaming Association.

• More than 80% of those bettors plan to wager via bracket contests. (For example: everyone tosses in $10 and the winner takes all.)
• But nearly 80% of the money is expected to go towards non-bracket bets, up from 55% last year.
• Twenty-nine million more Americans can legally (😉) bet on March Madness this year than last year, after markets launched in nine states: AZ, CT, LA, MD, ND, SD, WA, WI and WY.

💰 Zoom out: The legalized US sports betting market more than doubled last year, with 12% of American adults saying they now wager on sports at least weekly (up from 5% in January 2021).

• Goldman Sachs predicts the online sports gambling market will grow from ~$1 billion today to $39 billion by 2033.

+Fun fact: The odds of achieving a perfect bracket are 1 in 9,223,372,036,854,775,808. But if you know a little something about basketball, the odds drop to roughly 1 in 120,000,000,000.