The expansion of legal gambling options is a hot trend in the US at the moment. It hasn’t yet reached every corner of the country, however. Before you gamble, you need to know what the safe and legal forms available in your state are.
Unfortunately, real money online casino gaming is only available in a handful of states at the moment. A few others offer instant iLottery games that scratch a similar itch. But what if your state doesn’t have either?
The good news is that there’s another option, which doesn’t involve either abstaining from playing, or turning to illegal offshore casinos. These are what are known as sweepstakes casinos. There are even similar sites which will allow you to play poker on the same terms.
Sweepstakes casinos and sweepstakes poker rooms give you a chance to play your favorite games and win real money, 100% legally. You can even get in the action without spending a dime, if that’s what you want.
A sweepstakes casino is a type of online casino that blends play money action with cash prizes. These sites do this in such a way that they fall under sweepstakes law rather than gambling law. This makes them legal in most states, even ones that haven’t passed an iGaming bill.
We’ll explain the legal aspects in a moment. In practical terms, however, the most important aspect of sweepstakes sites is that they use a two-currency system. These are usually called Gold Coins and Sweeps Coins, though some sites use alternative terminology.
Officially, both currencies have no cash value. However, the Sweeps Coins can be redeemed for cash prizes. Typically, the dollar value of a prize will be equal to the numbers of Sweeps Coins you’ll have to trade in to receive it. That one-to-one ratio makes it easy to keep track of the current value of the prizes you could claim if you elect to stop playing and trade in your Sweeps.
You can’t directly deposit at a sweepstakes site. Rather, you make a purchase of the play money Gold Coins and receive, as a bonus, an amount of Sweeps Coins that corresponds to the value of your purchase. You can then play whatever games you like, using either currency. Playing with Gold Coins is just for fun, while using Sweeps Coins is more like a traditional casino experience.
Instead of withdrawing, you then redeem your Sweeps Coins for cash prizes. All of this means there are a few extra steps relative to a regular casino, but the once you’re playing, it’s almost the same thing.
