America’s sports betting market could be the biggest in the world if the practice was legal outside Nevada, according to new projections.

GamblingCompliance recently estimated that a fully developed US sports market – in which wagers were allowed through both land-based and digital channels – could generate annual revenue of $12.4b. That would be over five times the size of the UK’s mature sports betting market.

The projection comes as the US braces for the start of another National Football League season, and the American Gaming Association estimates that US bettors will wager around $95b on pro and college pigskin this year. Of this, only around $2b will be wagered with licensed bookies in Nevada, with the rest going to internationally licensed online sites, the back-of-the-bar bookie and office pools.

Of course, projections of how big the US market can become are meaningless so long as single-game sports betting remains illegal outside Nevada. That situation comes courtesy of the 1992 federal PASPA legislation, the demise of which New Jersey has been desperately trying to achieve for the past three years.