Fanatics turns betting into glue

This shows Fanatics is no longer using betting as a sidecar, it is turning gambling into the glue that ties its whole sports stack together. At roughly $650M of 2025 gaming revenue on $9.6B total revenue, sportsbook and prediction markets are large enough to matter, but still early enough that Fanatics can use them as a customer acquisition and engagement loop that sells more jerseys, cards, and event based wagers inside one brand.

• The key advantage is distribution. Fanatics already has more than 100M sports fans in its commerce base, so it can push a bettor from buying a team jersey or trading card into placing a bet, without paying the same customer acquisition costs as pure play sportsbooks like DraftKings or FanDuel.
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• Prediction markets deepen that loop because they expand gaming beyond a standard sportsbook app. Fanatics Markets operates across 24 states through regulated infrastructure, which lets Fanatics offer event contracts alongside sportsbook and casino products, and keep users inside its app for more moments across the sports calendar.
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• Compared with Kalshi, the difference is business model shape. Kalshi is a pure exchange built around event contracts, estimated at $260M of 2025 revenue, while Fanatics can treat gaming as one revenue stream inside a much larger sports commerce machine. That makes 7% mix more strategically important than the percentage alone suggests.
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From here, the likely path is more bundling, not less. Fanatics can keep using collectibles as the international wedge, then layer in gaming where regulation allows, moving closer to a sports super app where a fan shops, collects, and wagers in the same account and the same session.