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INDIANAPOLIS -- A House committee Wednesday approved a bill regulating daily fantasy sports after making some significant changes to the measure. And, there are more changes on the horizon before the legislative session ends.
The daily fantasy sports bill imposes some regulations on the industry. Those include a prohibition on insider information, and bans on professional athletes and officials from playing. It also levies an initial licensing fee, along with yearly fees for operators of daily fantasy games.
The original bill had a $5,000 initial fee and yearly fees. Rep. Tom Dermody’s amendment, approved by the House committee, raises those to a $75,000 initial fee, with a $20,000 yearly fee after that. Dermody says he thought $5,000 was too low.
“It would allow, potentially, quite a few – my fear, because I don’t know – bad actors," Dermody said. "So my goal was, from my perspective, to try to protect Hoosiers.”
Dermody’s amendment also dealt with taxing a player’s winnings and withholding overdue child support payments from those winnings. But the committee agreed that those provisions need more work and pledged to iron out those issues on the House floor.
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