Dom Hammond has been waiting for this moment: a World Cup with the American sports betting stage all to itself.

In 2018, legal state-by-state sports betting was only a month old when the tournament began in Russia. In 2022, the World Cup was held in Qatar in the fall, pitting it in a losing battle with football for the country’s betting dollars.

This year, the World Cup is standing alone. And Hammond, the senior vice president of sports at Caesars Entertainment, is feeling bullish.

“It’s not really competing with anything,” Hammond said. “You’ve got a World Cup held locally, here in the United States. It’s finally on a good time zone for us here. We’re expecting tremendous volume.”

The World Cup is finishing its fourth week and heading into the depths of the knockout rounds, and the country has been drawn to televisions. A total of 24.4 million people tuned in to watch the United States vs. Bosnia-Herzegovina match on July 1, which according to Fox Sports was the largest viewership for an English language soccer telecast ever.

People are watching. And for a sports gambling market that typically sees a considerable decline in handle (the amount wagered) and revenue in these months with only baseball on the slate, that means a boost — and maybe a considerable one.

“As soon as these events are front and center, the betting tends to follow,” said Hammond, whose company, along with DraftKings, runs one of the two regulated mobile sportsbooks in Maine. “The market is up 10% (compared to last year). I would anticipate that in June and July … that could very well be in excess of that 10%.”

Betting industry analysts, according to ESPN, project $2.9 billion to be bet on the World Cup nationally, which would top the $1.7 billion the site reported was wagered on the Super Bowl in February.

Hammond said he’s excited to see what the interest looks like in Maine, which he said has shown itself to be more interested in soccer than other states.

“Soccer, both in Maine and nationally, it’s our fourth most bet-on sport. (It) outperforms even hockey,” he said. “In Maine, it’s a lot closer in aggregate to baseball. Nationally, there’s a bit of a gap from three to four, but in Maine it’s much, much closer.”

Others anticipate a more modest uptick in betting action, and that for all its popularity, the World Cup won’t translate into as much gambling interest in the country as when professional and college football and basketball are in season.

“It’s still a fraction of what we would see in NFL, college football season, March Madness,” said Steven Silver, the chair of Maine’s gambling control board. “It’s certainly a bump, right? Because you’re not just left with Major League Baseball and the WNBA over the summer. But it will not touch what we see in the fall and winter months.”

Sports gambling revenue numbers for Maine in June have not yet been released by the Gambling Control Unit. In 2025, handle numbers for DraftKings and Caesars in the state for June and July were 68% of the average handle for September through December 2024.

Dr. Colin Lopez, an associate professor of exercise and sports science at the University of North Carolina, agreed that the World Cup will help the summer months fare better. According to Legal Sports Report, around $8.8 billion was wagered nationally last July, while June saw $10 billion wagered. September through January, meanwhile, all cleared $15.5 billion.

“It won’t be such a dramatic drop-off compared to some of the other (summers),” said Lopez, whose research is primarily in consumer behavior and sports gambling. “If we follow this $3 billion number that’s been thrown out there (the projection for June and July), if it’s $1.5 (billion per month), that gets it just over $10 (billion, the total from 2025), which is still going to be lower than May, February, some of the other low months.”

Lopez said soccer doesn’t have the tie to betting in the country that football and basketball do.

“(With football and basketball) there’s sort of an established gambling culture associated with those events,” he said. “(At) a Super Bowl party, a lot of people like doing the squares, and obviously there’s March Madness brackets.

“(There’s) an early exposure to gambling related to those events, where the World Cup doesn’t really have anything like that here.”

The exception, Lopez said, could come with the local squad. The United States team has commanded national attention after starting group stage play with a pair of impressive wins, and scoring its first knockout victory since 2002 to set up a showdown with Belgium on Monday in the round of 16.

Home teams spur betting action. And Lopez said continued success for the Americans could see that $3 billion figure for World Cup wagers become a conservative estimate.

Prediction markets have indicated as much; on Kalshi, the betting volume went from $86 million for the Paraguay game to $100 million for the next game against Australia, and then up to $180 million when the U.S. played Turkey.

“Oh 100%,” he said. “If they end up making it to the semifinals or something crazy like that, I think we would see a pretty substantial boost in there that could end up being half a billion dollars because of an extended run like that.”

There’s also the element of how the books, and therefore the state, could fare. Silver said he expects the World Cup to be an event where the bettors are at a disadvantage.

“I would think it would be a good time for the sportsbooks in the state. People are not as knowledgeable about soccer,” he said. “(And) it seemed like quite a lot of draws in the group stages, and I don’t know how many people were actually putting down bets on those draws happening.”

The growing popularity of prediction markets like Kalshi, however, could hurt the handle for DraftKings and Caesars.

“You could assume if they’re doing big numbers, there are also a lot of bets being placed on legal, regulated markets. But that can take a chunk, too,” he said. “There’s only so many gambling dollars in the state. … I’m sure there are people who otherwise would be wagering with a sportsbook that are now using the prediction markets.”