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 FanDuel received $23.6 million in entries overall for its National
Football League contests over the weekend, down 17 percent from two
weeks earlier, according to data from daily fantasy sports industry
tracker Super Lobby. Professional football is the most popular sport
for daily fantasy contests.
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman has asked a court to
shutter FanDuel and top competitor DraftKings in the state, saying
that daily fantasy sports gaming "is nothing more than a rebranding
of sports betting."
The companies will argue in a New York court on Wednesday that they
should be allowed to continue operating.
FanDuel stopped taking new deposits from New Yorkers two weeks ago
and then blocked users in the state from playing in the contests
last week.
DraftKings has continued taking money in the state.
The company's NFL guaranteed prize pool contests - the only
DraftKings contests that Super Lobby tracks - have taken a more
modest hit over the past two weeks. Over the past week, those
contests had total entry fees of $20.4 million, down 3.3 percent
over the two-week period.
FanDuel and DraftKings were not immediately available for comment.
Modern fantasy sports started in 1980 and surged in popularity
online. Participants typically create teams that span an entire
season in professional sports, including American football,
baseball, basketball and hockey.
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Daily fantasy sports, a turbocharged version of the season-long
game, have developed over the past decade. Players draft teams in
games played in just one evening or over a weekend.
The companies may have painted targets on their backs with
aggressive advertising at the start of the National Football League
season that promised large winnings. FanDuel has said it planned to
pay out $2 billion in cash prizes this year.
(Reporting by Michael Erman; Editing by Steve Orlofsky)
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