On Wednesday, the home Subcommittee on Commerce, Manufacturing, and Trade held a hearing on daily fantasy sports, despite no legislation at the table that will regulate the games. The hearing was informational in nature.

U.S. Rep. Frank Pallone (D-NJ) pushed for the hearing last year, as his state continues to fight in court with the key sports leagues and the NCAA over a 1992 federal law that forestalls New Jersey from having sports books in Atlantic City casinos. Atlantic City is currently in free fall way to a shrinking gambling market.

At the start of the hearing, Pallone called it “hypocrisy” that some companies and groups claim DFS isn’t gambling. Near the tip of the hearing, he criticized DraftKings and FanDuel, by far the biggest players within the DFS space, for applying for gambling licenses within the U.K. but saying in America that their product isn’t like traditional sports betting.

Pallone called for “fairness and transparency” within the DFS industry, citing data that shows roughly 90 percent of cash paid out by DFS sites goes to the highest one percent of players.

That point was elucidated by testimony from Kurt Eggert, professor of law at Chapman University. For the perfect players, DFS “isn’t a game of skill or chance, it’s a game of algorithms,” he said. Eggert compared the present way DFS operates to an off-the-cuff tennis player being pitted up against Roger Federer and never even knowing it. “What do you do to offer protection to the recreational player?” Eggert asked of the industry.

According to testimony from Peter Schoenke, chairman of the Fantasy Sports Trade Association and president of RotoWire.com, roughly 50 million Americans played some type of fantasy sports in 2015. The market is worth $26 billion between the united states.. and Canada.

Despite the recognition of fantasy sports, and the growing acclaim for DFS specifically ($2 billion in market size by 2020, in line with Eilers Research), the games shouldn’t be checked out on their own, but rather within the context of nationwide sports betting, Dr. Ryan Rodenberg, a professor at Florida State University with a focal point in sports law analytics, testified before members of Congress. It’s “difficult to judge DFS without sports betting,” he said.

Rodenberg’s comments aligned with what Pallone was articulating.

While there has been important information shared on the hearing, it did include some tired questions that pertain to the net gaming space usually. U.S. Rep. Michael Burgess (R-TX) asked if it was possible to stop underage players from accessing the DFS sites. Regulated online casino gaming in Nevada, New Jersey and Delaware have been running since 2013 without issue.

MGM Resorts International, one of the crucial largest casino developers within the world, had a presence on the hearing. John McManus, the firm’s executive VP and general counsel, testified that MGM had “great interest” in DFS, but decided against venturing into the distance at the moment on account of an absence of “legal clarity” and the truth that MGM wasn’t sure “how to make money” from it.

Though MGM isn’t involved with the business, McManus said that he thinks “house-banked” games should be regulated. Congresswoman Susan Brooks (R-IN), who hails from a state that passed DFS legislation in March on the way to give the federal government $50,000 per DFS license, said that Congress doesn’t need to “stifle innovation” through regulation.

The American Gaming Association, the casino industry’s top lobbying group on Capitol Hill, said in written testimony that its position in this topic is “simple.”

“DFS currently operates in a legal gray zone,” wrote AGA CEO Geoff Freeman. “We think it's going to be black and white. The gaming industry desires to see clear rules of the street that lay out where DFS goes to be legal, the way it goes to be regulated and the way consumers are going to be protected.”

With the Nevada sports betting market expected to grow to $5 billion (the handle) in 2016, and an illegal market in America worth up to 80 times that, the AGA is pushing for reform to the pro and Amateur Sports Protection Act of 1992. Freeman was quoted earlier this year as saying that “the next president goes to have that issue of legalizing sports betting on their desk, and I’m confident they’ll make the best decision.”

Wednesday’s hearing didn’t provide any indication that the present state-by-state regulation of DFS will change, nevertheless it may supply more momentum to the powerful calls to bring sports betting out of the shadows in America.

The NFL, the richest of the foremost sports leagues, indicated just days ago that its anti-gambling position is evolving. The comments from commissioner Roger Goodell come because the Oakland Raiders seriously consider a move to Las Vegas.

Read More... [Source: CardPlayer Poker News]