Last updated: June 12, 2026
Three numbers tell most of the US casino-state story right now. Pennsylvania logged its strongest April in years, North Carolina got its first new tribal casino in a billion-dollar build-out, and New York's three downstate license winners spent the spring losing money on the projects that are supposed to define the next decade of US gaming. None of these markets is a sweepstakes market — that's the federal-vs-state framing we wrote about elsewhere — but the contours of the licensed casino industry shape how sweepstakes brands position themselves alongside it.
Pennsylvania April: 6.5% up, online slots the engine
The Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board reported approximately $595 million in combined gaming revenue for April 2026, up 6.5 percent year over year. The component story is more useful than the headline.
- Retail slots: $206.7 million (+1.8%)
- Retail table games: $78.7 million (-2.4%)
- iGaming: $245.8 million (roughly +8%, online slots specifically +15.2%)
- Sports betting: $59 million (+38.6%)
- Video gaming terminals: $3.7 million (+5%)
iGaming is the largest single vertical in the state for the first time in any single month this year, and the online-slots growth rate of 15.2% has held for several consecutive reports. Hollywood Casino at Penn National Race Course led individual property results at $109 million (+11.6%). Valley Forge Casino Resort followed at $106 million. Live! Casino Philadelphia reported declines that PGCB did not detail in the headline release.
The two takeaways for any reader comparing state-by-state availability: Pennsylvania's iGaming engine continues to outgrow its retail base, and sports betting — despite a relatively small absolute number — is the fastest-growing vertical with 38.6% year-over-year acceleration.
Catawba Nation opens Two Kings phase one in Kings Mountain
On the North Carolina side, the Catawba Nation has opened the first public phase of its Two Kings Casino in Kings Mountain. The phase-one facility carries 1,350 slot machines, 36 electronic table games, 22 live table games, sports-betting kiosks, a restaurant, and a bar. There is no hotel in phase one.
Catawba is partnered with developer Delaware North on the project. Both sides have called this an introductory stage. The full resort plan calls for roughly 185,800 square meters of space, a 385-room hotel, 4,300 slot machines, and 100 table games, with completion targeted for spring 2027. The total project budget has been described publicly at approximately $1 billion.
For North Carolina readers, Two Kings is the state's first tribal casino opening of this scale since the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians' Harrah's properties — and it does so without offering full online iGaming, which North Carolina has not authorized.
New York's downstate licensees are not having a great spring
The three licensees that won the New York downstate process — Resorts World New York City (Queens), Bally's Bronx, and Hard Rock Metropolitan Park (Queens, with Mets owner Steve Cohen as a co-owner) — have each spent the past quarter dealing with the kind of headwind that wasn't in their original investor decks.
Resorts World, the only one of the three already operating, told CNBC in April that it was paying 63% on slots and has asked the state to lower that rate to match competitors. Slot handle is up; revenue is down week over week. Metropolitan Park, the Mets/Hard Rock project, told the Gaming Facility Location Board that foundation testing was originally scheduled to begin on January 1 but has not commenced; the Board described the construction timeline as “optimistic.” Bally's posted a Q1 net loss of $161 million — wider than analysts' $1.15-per-share loss projection — while managing concurrent investments across its broader US portfolio.
The downstate story matters for sweepstakes-adjacent coverage because analysts had predicted NYC would become the second-largest US casino market behind the Las Vegas Strip post-2030. That projection is not dead, but it is moving to the right. Sweepstakes brands operating in New York — LuckySlots, Stake.us, and the Priority Play roster all serve the state — will continue to face no licensed-casino retail competition in NYC itself for at least another build-cycle.
The pan-Atlantic angle: Hard Rock and Atlantic City
One quieter story sits in the middle of all of this. George Goldhoff, who previously ran Hard Rock Cincinnati and held senior roles at MGM Resorts and PURE Canadian Gaming, was recently named president of the Casino Association of New Jersey while also taking on the president and CEO role at Hard Rock Atlantic City. The CANJ represents Atlantic City's casino industry at exactly the moment when the NYC downstate process is putting pressure on Atlantic City's customer-flow assumptions. Goldhoff's appointment is the strongest signal yet that the Atlantic City—NYC dynamic is now the central regional question on the East Coast.
What this means for our state-restrictions readers
If you came to FortuneSweep looking for which sweepstakes platforms accept your state, the state-by-state casino news above does not change that. It does change the broader landscape readers should know about:
- Pennsylvania's iGaming maturation means licensed online slots are now a larger market than retail-floor slots — relevant context if you compare licensed-state economics to sweepstakes-state ones.
- North Carolina's first major tribal casino is a retail-only opening; the state remains closed to licensed online iGaming. Sweepstakes brands continue to serve NC players who prefer online play.
- New York's downstate slowdown extends, by another full build cycle, the gap between sweepstakes availability and licensed-casino availability in the largest US metro.
We will continue to update the state restrictions page as each market's posture shifts. The licensed-casino numbers above are the backdrop — not the substitute — for the sweepstakes coverage we publish state by state.
Sources: Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board April 2026 release, summarised by GGB Magazine. Catawba Nation Two Kings phase-one opening: GGB Magazine, May 21, 2026. New York downstate licensee status: iGaming Business, May 21, 2026. George Goldhoff / CANJ appointment: GGB Magazine, June 10, 2026.
