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Sports Betting-Rich Ontario Headed for DFS-Less Start to NFL Season

Ontarians have more than 30 provincially controlled online sportsbooks awaiting their business this NFL season.
However, as the regular season begins again, residents of Canada's most populated province will still have absolutely nothing similar for paid daily dream sports contests.
- Ontario sports wagerers still have actually no provincially managed options for paid daily dream sports (DFS) contests.
- Since April 2022, significant DFS operators like DraftKings and FanDuel have declined to provide paid contests in Ontario due to provincial guidelines and federal law.
- A possibly game-changing court case might allow Ontario DFS players to take on users outside Canada, but a choice is still pending and most likely to be interested the Supreme Court.
That DFS-less status quo has been in place since April 2022, when the brand-new Ontario sports betting and iGaming market launched, bringing multiple private-sector operators under provincial oversight.
Ontario's iGaming rules treat paid DFS as betting and for that reason need business that provide contests to sign up with the local regulator and pay a roughly 20% tax on profits, as an online sportsbook or gambling establishment would.
Moreover, the province's regulations need all individuals to be physically located in Ontario, limiting the size of DFS contests.
These conditions, the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario (AGCO) has actually acknowledged, have triggered iGaming operators (such as DraftKings and FanDuel) to ditch "pay-to-play" fantasy sports.
Instead, former DFS operators in Ontario offer only their online sports wagering and casino items. Other DFS business, such as PrizePicks and Underdog, have stayed away from Ontario completely.
"Choosing whether to provide pay-to-play dream sports is an individual business decision that rests with signed up operators," the AGCO states. "The AGCO is committed to making sure Ontarians can securely and responsibly enjoy their preferred sports betting items, including pay-to-play dream sports offerings, in Ontario's new igaming market."
All of this is an irritant to DFS enthusiasts in Ontario who might have chosen setting lineups to placing SGPs. While they have numerous provincially managed alternatives with which to do the latter, for the former, they have absolutely nothing.
Potentially big news for Ontario-based day-to-day dream and poker fans: the provincial government is asking the Court of Appeal whether enabling citizens to get involved in online video games and wagering involving individuals beyond Canada is legal. https://t.co/sv2ouYlVQY pic.twitter.com/Eanx9zgAS0
For now, a minimum of.
There is a potential landmark court case ongoing that might alter all of this. That case, or reference, involves the Ontario federal government asking the province's Court of Appeal if it would be legal to let online gamblers have fun with people beyond Canada.
If the court were to say yes (and the province believes it should), then a DFS operator could connect Ontario DFS players to DFS players in the U.S. or additional abroad. Then, it would potentially make more monetary sense to operators to again provide paid dream sports contests in Ontario. It would likewise attend to a deeper pool of online poker gamers in the province.
"Using poker as an example, a player in Ontario would have the ability to sit down at a virtual poker table and contend with players from around the globe," an executive for PokerStars and FanDuel owner Flutter Entertainment PLC said in a May 2024 affidavit connected to the court recommendation. "Similarly, if everyday dream sports were to be offered, a specific in Ontario could wager and take part in an everyday fantasy sports league involving individuals from beyond Canada."
Simply put, Ontario sees a way for its gamers to stay regulated and secured by the province while playing with bettors beyond Canada, who would be managed and safeguarded by their regional systems.
Trailblazing can burn
This is especially noteworthy since Ontario is the only province in Canada with a regulated iGaming market that permits numerous private-sector operators to get involved. It is an island of private-sector competitors in a sea of government-authorized monopolies.
Ontario's "scheme," so to speak, is one of one in Canada, and the province now wishes to link it to schemes outside Canada. It might also link the plan to a comparable one in Alberta that is being developed, however will not introduce till next year. Ontario could eventually connect with other provinces also, if they are ever so inclined.
"Our position is the game is 2 schemes connecting with each other," stated Josh Hunter, a lawyer for Ontario's Ministry of the Attorney General Of The United States, during a hearing on the court reference last November.
By enabling operators to supply bigger poker video games and paid DFS contests to provincial gamblers, Ontario might pull even more players onto its regulated iGaming sites. That is, after all, one of the main factors for launching a managed iGaming market - to get gamblers out of the "grey" and "black" markets and into a fully regulated one.
"Our company believe it would better safeguard individuals of Ontario," argued Ananthan Sinnadurai, another legal representative for the AG's office, throughout last November's hearing.
ETA TBD
However, a response to the provincial federal government's concern has actually been impressive because the hearing last November, when the Court of Appeal judges listened to arguments relating to the "online video gaming and worldwide play" reference.
There is no indicator of when that judgment will be delivered either. There's also no guarantee that if the decision were released tomorrow (the court's website suggests it will not), DFS would suddenly spring back to life in Ontario.
Furthermore, it is likely (if not certain) that whatever the Court of Appeal decides, it will be appealed to the Supreme Court of Canada.
"There is an arrangement in the Supreme Court Act which creates a right of attract the Supreme Court of Canada from the Court of Appeal's choice in any referral question, which suggests the likelihood of this case ending in the Court of Appeal for Ontario is, I believe, relatively low," stated Adam Goldenberg, a partner at McCarthy Tétrault LLP, during a panel at this year's Canadian Gaming Summit in Toronto.
The court records for Ontario's DFS/poker reference include a great deal of Parliamentary argument about Canadian betting law. Here's a lawyer in 1985 describing the rationale for Canada's longstanding (now gone) restriction on single-game wagering. No "funny games," please, we're Canadian. pic.twitter.com/PYOLuBRaCa
As the above quote suggests, this is made complex stuff.
The Court of Appeal doesn't get asked concerns by the provincial government every day either, or perhaps every year.
"The form of the case is uncommon," stated Danielle Bush, senior counsel at McCarthy Tétrault LLP, throughout the Canadian Gaming Summit. "I think that we figured out that the Court of Appeal in Ontario had only heard another reference case 17 years earlier."
A lot has actually been thrown at the Court of Appeal as well.
While there is a "yes" side in the reference (the Ontario federal government and private-sector online betting business), there is likewise a "no" side, that includes a number of government-owned lotto and gaming corporations (albeit not the Alberta and Ontario lottery games).
These lotteries are members of the so-called Canadian Lottery Coalition. And these lottery games, such as the British Columbia Lottery Corp., have a bone to pick with Ontario and its licensed iGaming operators.
That is due to the fact that these lottery games and their iGaming websites, such as BCLC's PlayNow, have government-authorized monopolies for controlled online betting in their home . However, they say they discover themselves competing for company versus Ontario-licensed iGaming brand names that are taking bets in provinces that are definitely not Ontario.
These lotteries are worried, as the union's executive director said in an April 2024 affidavit, that the Ontario liquidity referral "could lead to the more proliferation of unlawful online gaming."
Bad Bodog!
These concerns were voiced during the DFS-related hearing before Ontario's Court of Appeal last November.
However, it's not simply in Ontario where the lottery game coalition has been active in the courts, as the Manitoba lotto won an injunction against overseas sportsbook Bodog in May. That choice has apparently been sent out to the appeals judges in Ontario for the DFS-related reference, potentially providing another thing to consider.
That is since the issue of unregulated operators was something asked about throughout Ontario's liquidity recommendation, and the lack of a decision versus an overseas sportsbook was duly noted at the time.
Now, there is a decision, and it may be one that the five-judge panel in Ontario is mulling over as it refers to "online gaming and global play."
"They've (the lotteries) gone back now and they have actually said, 'OK, we did it, and here's what the court in Manitoba said,'" Bush stated. "It is certainly strategic.