We're just four weeks into the new NFL season. Your favorite team may be winning or losing, but the game itself is faring better than you think. NFL stadiums are operating at full capacity after last year's pandemic-saddled run. TV ratings are up. If you're a fan of the game you may also be participating in more fantasy football leagues than ever.
Competing against fellow gridiron enthusiasts to assemble rosters of players based on their weekly performances has never been hotter than it is right now. The global fantasy sports market has ballooned from $20.36 billion last year to a projected $22.31 in 2021, according to market research specialist Research & Markets.
It should only continue to thrive, with Research & Markets targeting a market of $38.6 billion by 2025, a compound annual growth rate of nearly 15%. Investors can cash in, too, of course. Two fairly obvious beneficiaries of our growing obsession with fantasy sports are DraftKings (DKNG 1.63%) and fuboTV (FUBO 6.72%). Let's take a closer look at why these two companies aren't likely to fumble the opportunity.
Image source: Getty Images.
1. DraftKings
Watch enough sports programming and you're going to run across ads for DraftKings and FanDuel, the two leaders of fantasy sports wagering. FanDuel is a subsidiary of U.K.-based holding company Flutter Entertainment, and while you can just buy Flutter now for exposure to FanDuel before the inevitable spinoff IPO, DraftKings is a smart pure play that's exploded in popularity with investors since hitting the market last year.
Business is booming at DraftKings. Its monthly active payers base has grown by 281% over the past year. Revenue shot 320% higher in its latest quarter. We're not just talking about you deciding between Patrick Mahomes or Josh Allen as your starting quarterback this weekend. DraftKings operates a full-blown sportsbook to take traditional game bets in markets where it's legal.
DraftKings has been sacked by investors since making a buyout offer for European online gambling giant Entain late last month. The deal valued at roughly $20 billion would be nearly twice as much as casino and sportsbook giant MGM Resorts International was offering to pay for Entain before that proposal came undone in January.
With or without Entain, DraftKings is a rising star in a rising niche. As more states turn a kinder eye to gambling as a way to pump up tax revenue -- and the popularity of fantasy sports continues to ascend -- DraftKings finds itself in the red zone ready to score.
2. fuboTV
You might not expect a small company behind a fast-growing live-TV streaming service to be the other fantasy football play here, but try fuboTV on for size. The platform has emerged as a smart choice for cord-cutters still looking for access to live sports after kicking their cable and satellite television providers to the curb. A subscription to fuboTV includes more than 100 live TV channels covering all interests, but the heart of the platform is the more than three dozen channels that offer live sports programming.
fuboTV is thinking bigger than just taking on Alphabet's YouTube TV or Dish Network's Sling. This summer it introduced free predictive on-screen games with subscribers competing for prizes if they can forecast in-game events. It also rolled out a proprietary live-stats platform that will naturally make it easier to track your fantasy sports interest on a single screen.
Like DraftKings, fuboTV sees this as a gateway drug to big-money betting on sports itself. By the end of the year fuboTV expects to launch an app-based sportsbook that will pair up with whatever a subscriber is watching on TV. Like DraftKings, fuboTV will have to take that opportunity on a state-by-state basis with regulatory hurdles to clear across the country. However, it's also already coming through with monster triple-digit growth.
Revenue nearly tripled, up 196% in its latest quarter. In a world of promising streaming service stocks, it's hard to find a name growing faster than fuboTV these days. Its user base has risen 138% to more than 680,000 accounts generating an average of $71.43 a month in revenue through subscription fees as well as the rapid expansion of its advertising business.
If you love fantasy sports there's never been an easier time to get into the game with two stocks posting triple-digit revenue growth. You've won the coin toss. Now you have to decide if you want to kick or receive.
