The 13 riverboats that make up the Missouri casino industry ended a record fiscal year in June.
Despite a decline from the revenue reported in May, the Show-Me-State broke a yearly mark that had stood for more than a decade.
All told, the total adjusted gross revenue (AGR) for the 2021-22 fiscal year, which ended on June 30, was just more than $1.9 billion ($1,904,681,521.86, to be exact). That was a 10.4% increase over the $1.726 billion in 2020-21 and a bump of about $100 million compared to the $1.806 billion that had been the state’s high-water mark since 2011, according to financial archives on the Missouri Gaming Commission website.
Here are three takeaways for Missouri gaming in June.
Steady Growth For Missouri Casinos
From 1994, when the first two riverboat casinos opened in Missouri, the state has seen steady growth in its revenue numbers.
Since first surpassing $1 billion in annual AGR in 1999-2000, Missouri casinos have reached that mark each year. Now they’re in position to perhaps exceed $2 billion in the 2022-23 fiscal year, which began July 1.
Though Missouri hadn’t set a new record in a while, the standard was $1.7 billion per year or so for the past decade. The lone exception was in the FY ending in June 2020, when casino closures related to COVID-19 knocked the number down to $1.35 billion.
The gaming proceeds earmarked for education funding in the Show-Me State came to nearly $360 million for the 2021-22 fiscal year, bringing the total to more than $7.3 billion since riverboat gambling was legalized. The gaming proceeds for local government in 2021-22 added up to $40 million.
There are no online casino options in the state, nor is there any Missouri sports betting underway.
Efforts to get sports wagering legalized any time soon stalled when a proposal failed to get out of the state Senate before the 2022 legislative session ended in May.
June a Down Month in Revenue
The good news for Missouri casinos was the record-breaking fiscal year total. The bad news was that June was hardly a record month.
The AGR last month was $151,576,784 in Missouri, down 7.3% from the $163,539,011 reported in May by the Missouri Gaming Commission. That May total, in turn, was 5.1% lower than the $172.26 million in April and marked the third consecutive month of decline since the calendar year peak of $176.7 million in March.
June’s revenue was also a 2.6% drop in a year-over-year comparison with June 2021, when it was $155.6 million.
The gaming proceeds to education in June came to $28,648,012.
Breakdown of Missouri Riverboat Casinos in June
As usual, Ameristar Casino in St. Charles led the state in revenue for June at $24.15 million. About $19.3 million of the total came from slot machines, with the rest from table games and hybrid games (the latter are only offered at Ameristar, Hollywood Casino & Hotel St. Louis and Argosy in Kansas City).
Ameristar was the only Missouri casino to top $20 million in AGR for the month, with River City Casino second at $19.9 million and Hollywood third with $18.1 million.
In the Kansas City market, the Ameristar location there topped the list at nearly $16.6 million, then came Argosy ($15 million) and Harrah’s ($14.17 million). Among out state facilities (those outside of the St. Louis and Kansas City metro areas), Isle Casino in Boonville had the most revenue with $6.88 million.
