FanDuel Sportsbook announced that it had its highest-ever monthly hold percentage in June.
In its Q2 earnings report, the largest legal online gambling platform in the U.S. said that it had a gross revenue margin of 16.3% from sports bets during the month.
It was the best ever month in terms of the sportsbook’s hold.
The hold is the amount the sportsbook retained after paying out winning bets.
FanDuel credited parlays, wagers that combine multiple outcomes into a single bet, with the record hold in June.
“Structural revenue margin expansion of 70bps to 13.6% [was] enabled by our market-leading pricing and risk management capabilities delivering continued increased penetration of parlay bets,” the company said in the earnings report.
FanDuel Baseball Parlays
FanDuel also said a new baseball gambling feature fueled parlay wagering.
In the quarter, FanDuel unveiled its “Batter Up” feature, allowing customers to parlay outcomes for the next three batters.
“Home run parlays are printing money for the sportsbooks,” wrote Iain MacMillan, an editor with Sports Illustrated, in response to the FanDuel June hold percentage of 16.3.
Ted Knutson, a founder in the sports betting content space and former trader at Pinnacle Sports, called the FanDuel record hold “gross.”
“All I see on my timeline is people winning home run parlays for tens of thousands of dollars,” said another observer. “Yet FanDuel is keeping more money than ever. How can that be?”
Gamblers often celebrate wins publicly while keeping losses secret. It’s one reason why gambling is called the hidden addiction.
“FanDuel is a sports lottery company, not a sports betting company,” another person commented about the popularity of parlays versus wagers such as the moneyline or spread.
Why FanDuel Hold Raises Eyebrows
FanDuel leads the industry in terms of siphoning off money from sports bettors.
In the fourth quarter of 2024, FanDuel reported a 14.5% hold compared to 10.5% for DraftKings, according to Covers. All other major US sportsbooks were in the single digits.
In Nevada, the oldest sports betting market in the U.S., the sportsbook industry held just 6% of wagers in 2024, according to the UNLV Center for Gaming Research.
FanDuel appears to be the industry leader in pushing people to parlay bets. One way the industry promotes parlays is through push notifications.
While parlays typically involve relatively small bets, they are bad for consumers because sportsbooks offer predatory odds for these long-shot bets.
Parlays, especially when coupled with in-game betting, are highly addictive products.
Read more: Parlays Are Bad For Your Brain: The Near-Miss Effect
Read more: Sports Betting Addiction Statistics
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