- Sports betting will launch in Colorado on Friday, May 1.
- All gaming properties in the state are currently closed due to the Coronavirus pandemic.
- At least four mobile gaming apps are expected to be available on launch day.
A new era of sports betting begins on Friday as the state of Colorado comes online. Unfortunately, the day won’t be a particularly big event since all of the casinos in the state are currently closed under the direction of Governor Jared Polis due to the Coronavirus pandemic. That means it’ll be a little longer before retail sports betting begins in the state but there will be at least four mobile apps available for wagering at the time of launch. As of a couple of days ago, DraftKings, FanDuel, BetRivers and BetMGM had all indicated that they’d be ready to go.
By late May, a number of other companies are expected to have their mobile offerings ready including BetWildwood (a partnership between Cripple Creek’s Wildwood Casino and Internet Sports International, a company best known for wagering kiosks), FoxBet, PointsBet, and SBK (the fixed odds brand of UK based wagering market company Smarkets). Nevada’s newest sports betting provider Circa Sports has indicated a launch timeframe of early June for their Colorado app. Also, they haven’t announced anything but I’d imagine that William Hill will have their app available sooner rather than later.
On Thursday, April 30 the Colorado Limited Gaming Control Commission held a special meeting via streaming video. The meeting was plagued by audio issues and didn’t last very long though one very important item was taken care of. The commission voted to approve a revised catalog of approved sports, leagues and bets that included NCAA sports. Although the specifics were unclear, commission chair Kristen Blessman indicated that ‘only the one bet type’ (college sports props) had been removed. The meeting was quickly adjourned after that. The vibe I got was that the primary purpose was to finalize the betting catalog but the agenda for the meeting had a number of licensing requests listed so I’m not sure what the disposition of those will be.
Among the license applications the most interesting was the ‘Internet sports betting operator license’ sough by CG Colorado LLC, d/b/a as Carousel Group. Carousel Group is a growing player in the sports, iGaming and digital entertainment space with offices in Spain and Malta. Among other things, they offer online sports betting at Sportsbetting.com along with horse wagering at Racebook.com. Assuming they’re approved they would be betting company #18 already in or preparing to enter the Colorado market. More on that when I find out something….
We looked over the previous release of the Colorado sports betting catalog here:
COLORADO DIVISION OF GAMING RELEASES CATALOG OF APPROVED SPORTS AND LEAGUES
We had our most recent prediction about how huge the Colorado market will be here:
COLORADO IS THE NEXT BIG US SPORTS BETTING MARKET
Once the COVID-19 lockdown is relaxed sufficiently we’ll be heading out to Colorado for a first hand look at where things stand.
