Delays to legal sports betting in Missouri – When will it go live in the state?

Missouri residents hoping to bet on the Chiefs or Royals this year, may well face disappointment. News indicates that officials have set the market’s launch date for a further delay.

In the most recent development, Missouri’s secretary of state rejected an emergency rules request from the region’s Gaming Commission, refusing to create an extended timeframe for the market’s launch.

But why is the potential launch likely to be delayed beyond June. The question remains, when exactly will sports betting go live in the state?

It was on November 5th, 2024 that Missouri locals narrowly voted to pass so-called “Amendment 2”. This proposed the legalization of sports betting in the state, with online and mobile skins expected to launch prior to December 1st, 2025.

The Missouri Gaming Commission has already awarded licenses to brands like Draft Kings and Fan Duel. They were hoping to launch in the summer, around June. However, several developments have now delayed this, including confusion over the bill’s initial wording. Additionally, they need to consider how to allocate skins to existing physical casinos in the state.

Initially, people thought that officials would award a single digital skin per casino brand. This was attractive to existing operators, many of whom run two or more land-based casinos. As a result, Caesars Entertainment began legal efforts to challenge the proposal, only for the MGC to reinterpret the law to award one digital skin to each individual casino.

However, this remains somewhat of a gray area, as officials have yet to confirm the final interpretation and rules.

Refusing an Emergency Rules Request and Compromising the December Deadline?

The state has until December 1st to launch remote betting, prompting the MGC to make an emergency rules request at the beginning of the year. If accepted, this would have pushed the deadline back and created an extended timeframe in which to go live.

As a result, the current deadline will remain in place. This is despite the fact that previous estimates of a June launch will now be delayed significantly. There are now concerns that the launch date will be after the first game of the 2025 NFL season. September 4th is when the Philadelphia Eagles will kickstart the defence of their Super Bowl crown.

Sportsbooks in the state also expect to miss out on the lucrative Super Bowl outright futures market. This is because most bettors wager on this market prior to the start of the season.

For now, it appears that remote sports betting will still go live in Missouri prior to December 1st, 2025. However, it may launch worryingly close to this date, especially if the bill’s wording and rules change further in the coming months.

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