Indiana could soon legalise sports betting

A legislative study committee recommended sports betting legislation to be passed by the 2019 General Assembly.

US.- After PASPA got struck down by the Supreme Court, several states legalised sports betting in the US and many others began studying whether to do it or not. Indiana is among the latter and could soon regulate the segment as a legislative study committee unanimously recommended that the 2019 General Assembly should consider that possibility.

According to the committee, casinos should be the only authorised to offer sports betting, as well as off-track betting facilities owned by the two central Indiana horse track casinos. However, they also suggested that remote betting (at casinos) should be available in order to take advantage of the mobile segment.

“Giving the customer a lot of choices is what we would expect to see,” Vice President of Government Relations at the industry testing company Gaming Laboratories International Kevin Mullally said as he backed mobile betting as an option for the potential segment. “From a regulatory perspective, mobile wagering actually offers regulators many more tools to know the customer, to follow the money and to have data on a very transactional level,” he added.

State Sen. Ron Alting, who chairs the Senate Public Policy Committee, advanced he fully expects a proposal for legalised sports wagering to be filed at the Statehouse in January. “You definitely need to dot your I’s and cross your T’s on this,” he said and stated: “We don’t want to write ‘a’ bill, we want to write the best bill.”