Paysafe Begins Supporting Newly Legal Massachusetts Sports-Betting Market

Paysafe has expanded into Massachusetts to serve the newly legal sports gambling market.

The entertainment-focused payment platform is supporting the mobile sports-betting market by enabling players to fund their accounts by debit card, its own alternative payment methods (APMs) and third-party APMs, Paysafe said Thursday (March 30).

The firm is powering payments for DraftKings, Caesars Entertainment and multiple other sportsbooks, the company said.

“We’re excited to expand into Massachusetts, my home state and an important milestone in the evolution of the U.S. iGaming industry, with its passionate sports culture and pivotal industry role in the development of daily fantasy sports and now sports betting,” Paysafe President of Global Gaming Zak Cutler said in the press release.

Retail sportsbooks began taking bets in Massachusetts on Jan. 31 — requiring gamblers to go to one of the state’s three casinos to bet in person — but mobile sportsbook apps had to wait until March.

As PYMNTS reported Feb. 1, online sportsbook betting is on both a fast track and a slow roll. Twenty-six states plus Washington, D.C. have legalized online wagering, but operators are undergoing exhaustive reviews state by state to get permission for online wagering from anywhere.

For Paysafe, Massachusetts is the 26th iGaming jurisdiction in which it supports sports-betting operators with online payments. It’s also the 21st state in which the firm has partnered with DraftKings and with Caesars Entertainment, according to the press release.

“We’re also proud to extend our longstanding relationships with several major sports-betting partners into this new market, and we look forward to helping them maximize their player acquisition and retention in Massachusetts, just as we’ve done in multiple other U.S. states,” Cutler said in the release.

PYMNTS research has found that casinos and online platforms need to invest in payments modernization, as using legacy payment systems limits their ability to meet customers’ demand for instant payments.

An updated payments system that supports instant payments and other payment methods will attract new customers and retain old ones, as evidenced by the fact that 67% of consumers said they would be more inclined to continue doing business with a company that offered instant payments, according to “Casinos, Gambling and Gaming Platforms Bet on Instant Payments,” a PYMNTS and Ingo Money collaboration.