FanDuel, the parent company of TVG, shut down one or more accounts on its horse racing wagering platform on Wednesday and has started an investigation into suspicious bets placed in a number of super-exotic pools earlier that afternoon, the company said in a prepared statement.
The statement said that FanDuel had identified “technical issues and potential fraud” in the accounts that were shut down. The accounts were used to bet millions of dollars into superfecta and super high five pools on Wednesday afternoon at both Thoroughbred and harness tracks. Several trifecta and exacta pools at some of the tracks may also have been affected, according to a review of historical wagering data.
“In cooperation with regulatory authorities, the company is undertaking a full review of this matter and will make public additional details at its conclusion,” the statement said.
According to officials with knowledge of the incidents, the bets seemed to originate from one account at TVG. At one track, the bets were made in $20 denominations using all the runners in each spot in the wager, and were therefore guaranteed to generate winning tickets.
All account holders at TVG and other account-wagering companies are required to provide detailed personal information to bet through the platforms, raising questions about how the bettor expected to escape notice.
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At Churchill Downs, management put a hold on a distribution of a super high five bet in the track’s fourth race on Wednesday after the wager attracted $750,000 in handle. In the third race, the super high five attracted slightly less than $2,000 in bets. As of late afternoon, Churchill officials were still contemplating whether to pay out the wager, according to Darren Rogers, Churchill’s vice president of communications.
The Churchill race had seven entrants, the minimum necessary for hosting a super high five under state regulations. The race was won by the third choice, followed by the favorite, followed by the fourth choice, followed by the second choice, and then filled out by the fifth choice. Two longshots finished sixth and last.
Rogers said that no other pool on the Churchill card had been affected in the same way as the fourth race.
Other tracks on Wednesday afternoon also had enormous handles in some of their pools, including Finger Lakes, where the fifth race superfecta attracted $395,298, or 15 times the handle of the superfecta in the preceding race. Two harness tracks, Monticello and the Meadows, also had suspiciously large superfecta pools in their mid-afternoon races, with two of the pools exceeding $1 million and the other topping $950,000.
The Finger Lakes superfecta in the fifth race paid $22.22 for a 10-cent wager. The seven-horse race was won by the favorite, followed by the second choice, third choice, and fifth choice.
The sixth race superfecta also had a high handle, at $113,564. That 10-cent superfecta paid $323.80 after it was won by a 38-1 shot, followed by a horse at 26-1, followed by a horse at 15-1, followed by the 9-2 second choice. The 1-4 favorite finished last.
