“Our primary focus is always to serve sports fans and we know they want both betting content and the ability to place bets with less friction from within our products,” ESPN chairman Jimmy Pitaro said in a statement.
Penn stock jumped as much as 30% in after-hours trading on the news. Up until now, the company has partnered with sportsbooks like Caesars and DraftKings on advertising and odds partnerships, but it had stopped short of putting its name on a sportsbook. The news ends years of speculation about whether (and how) ESPN might eventually wade into the booming U.S.
