Pennsylvanian Casino’s Enjoy Record Table Game Takings

Pennsylvania’s 12 casinos enjoyed a record month in March with table games bringing in more than ever before. Gamblers lost $67.93 million playing poker and other table games, the most since table gambling begun in July 2010.

The previous high was in March 2013 when $551,490 less was lost.

The Sands Casino Resort Bethlehem held the top spot for table games and brought in $15.3 million in revenue. However, the biggest gain in dollars was at SugarHouse which recorded an $825,555 increase in table games revenues. The casino is due to open a $155 million expansion next year.

Overall the state collected $9.8 million in tax revenue from table games.

However, despite the increase in table gaming revenues, it wasn’t enough to offset the year-on-year decline of 4.2% for casino gambling overall. The decline is mainly due to the drop in popularity of slot machine gaming.

Pennsylvania opened its first casino in 2007 and it recently overtook neighboring New Jersey in overall casino take. However, there are worries that New Jersey’s recent legalization of online gambling could have a negative impact on the Pennsylvania market.

Richard McGarvey from the Gaming Control Board said, “From our point of view, we don’t know – it’s too early to tell if it’s having any impact. There’s just no real good information on it, on who are the players, if they’re the kind of people who go to casinos or not.”