A $1 contract can be worth 40 cents today and 65 cents next week. That's the business behind prediction markets, and American sports organizations are getting involved. There's plenty happening here beyond picking the winner of Sunday's game.The Steelers might be flying in September and ...
Every so often, a line item in a city budget tells a bigger story than the number beside it suggests. In Weirton, that line item often involves gaming-tax revenue — the money generated by the regional gaming and wagering economy that trickles back into municipal coffers. When Weirton Council sits down to map out spending for roads, utilities, and marquee projects like the long-awaited Market Street Bridge replacement, that revenue stream frequently becomes the quiet hero of the conversation. It is the kind of funding that does not make headlines on its own, yet it shapes what the ...
West Virginia Weighs Online Gaming Rules Spend any time reading through the bills that cross the desks of West Virginia lawmakers, and a pattern starts to emerge. More and more of the state's economic future lives on the internet. Data centers, broadband expansion, remote work incentives, and digital commerce now share agenda space with the familiar debates over roads, schools, and coal. For residents of Weirton and the Northern Panhandle, who have watched the regional economy reinvent itself more than once, this shift feels both new and oddly familiar. And tucked into that conversation ...
Walk down Main Street in Weirton or past the shops near the Three Springs Drive corridor, and most transactions still look the way they always have. Cash changes hands at the counter, a card taps the reader, and a receipt prints out. But a quieter conversation is happening behind some of those counters. A handful of local business owners have started asking the kind of questions that would have sounded far-fetched not long ago: Could a customer pay with Bitcoin? What exactly is a digital wallet? And why are so many people suddenly talking about using crypto for everything from ...
Across the Ohio Valley, the way adults unwind after a long shift keeps shifting. A generation ago, a free evening in Belmont County might have meant a card game at a friend's kitchen table or a drive to a riverboat. Today, more of that downtime happens on a phone or a laptop, tucked into the recliner after dinner. And with Ohio's launch of legal sports betting and West Virginia's already-established online gaming, plenty of residents in Martins Ferry, Bridgeport, and across the river in Wheeling are asking a practical question: what's the actual difference between playing casino-style ...
When the sun dips behind the hills and the summer heat starts to loosen its grip, Beatty Park in Weirton fills with a familiar sound. Lawn chairs unfold across the grass, coolers click shut, and a band tunes up on the shell stage while neighbors wave hello. For decades, these evening concerts have been one of the simplest pleasures in the northern panhandle — free music, easy company, and no need to drive far to find it. They also say something bigger about how the Ohio Valley keeps itself entertained: people want good, low-effort fun close to home, whether that means a live show ...
