Pushing Regulated Sports Betting in Quebec: Pros & Cons
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00:00 (upbeat music)
00:02 - Let's talk a little bit about North of the border here.
00:08 It's an intriguing story.
00:09 Got a lot of friends there in Canada,
00:13 but it appears that Quebec is looking to,
00:16 I guess really, is this all about regulation right now,
00:20 what they're talking about?
00:22 - Yeah, and again, Canada is a strange market.
00:25 In 2021, they legalized single event sports betting.
00:28 Now they had parlay betting through the lotteries
00:31 before that, so it wasn't completely unknown.
00:35 And from there, all the provinces launched
00:39 lottery sports betting products.
00:41 Now, since then, Ontario is the only one
00:44 to launch a commercial market,
00:45 and they have a lot of sports books in that.
00:47 It's a massive, massive market.
00:50 But beyond that, all the other provinces
00:53 have just kind of sat on their hands and said,
00:55 you know what, we're fine with a lottery monopoly.
00:58 Now, what happened this spring was a coalition
01:01 of sports books, including DraftKings
01:03 and the parent companies of the BadmGM and FanDuel
01:08 came out and they said, you know what,
01:12 we want a very similar market in Quebec,
01:15 because Quebec is also a massive market on its own.
01:18 On its own in Canada, I think it's the second
01:20 most populous province, so it makes sense.
01:24 That's where the sports books wanna go next.
01:26 And so they released a thing that said,
01:28 a lot of Quebecers want a regulated sports betting market
01:33 for commercial operators.
01:35 Well, this month, they released a report that said,
01:39 the bettors in the market, most of them,
01:43 more than two thirds of them are betting
01:45 with gray market operators.
01:47 Now, unlike the US where offshore operators
01:50 are known as black market, up in Canada,
01:54 if there's not a regulated commercial market,
01:56 they just kind of operate in this gray area.
01:58 They're not necessarily illegal,
02:00 but they're not explicitly legal
02:01 in paying taxes and the like.
02:03 So, they are betting on that.
02:05 And that's basically the coalition saying,
02:07 the lottery monopoly is not working.
02:11 So let's get this figured out.
02:13 Let's get commercial operators out there
02:15 and producing a good amount of tax revenue for the province.
02:19 And player safety is also a major reason
02:23 they want to open a commercial market.
02:25 So, we'll see what happens.
02:27 It's been a slow go up there in other provinces.
02:32 We've heard some about Alberta and British Columbia.
02:36 It doesn't seem like there's much movement there either.
02:38 So the coalition's kind of putting all their efforts
02:41 in Quebec and yeah, again, we'll see what happens.
02:48 But it's something to watch for sure.
02:52 And we'll see where it goes from there.
02:55 (upbeat music)
02:58 (bells chiming)