Bwin.party downturn continues ahead of GVC takeover
Operator reports a 10% year-on-year decline in Q3 revenues with poker hit particularly hard
Bwin.party has attributed the lack of a major football tournament and the sale of non-core business assets to another difficult quarter after the operator this morning reported a 10% year-on-year decline in Q3 revenues.
Total revenues for the three-month period ended 30 September fell from 148.7m in Q3 2014 to 133.4m this year leading to clean EBITDA of 32.5m.
Revenues were down across all verticals apart from bingo, which jumped 5% to 12.7m off the back of major adverting campaigns for its Foxy Bingo and Cheeky Bingo brands earlier in the year.
Sportsbook revenues were down 8% to 54.3m, which the firm attributed to the lack of a major football tournament during the period coupled with lower margins.
Poker suffered particularly badly, with revenues tumbling 24% to 13.5m while casino revenues dipped 8% to 44.6m during the quarter.
The operator’s Q3 numbers take total revenues for the first nine months of the year to 429.9m, down 8% on the previous year.
Clean EBITDA was up 5% to 79.8m during the nine-month period, which the operator said would have resulted in a 26% YoY increase had it not been for EU VAT and the Point of Consumption tax.
“Our operating and financial performance is continuing to improve on the back of changes that we initiated in previous periods,” Norbert Teufelberger, bwin.party CEO, said.
“Current trading has been strong, despite the impact of EU VAT and further declines in poker.
“With solid progress expanding our mobile footprint and the full year benefit of the cost savings already made, we remain confident about the outlook,” he added.
The operator said current trading, from 1 October 2015 to 24 October 2015, had been “strong” with average daily revenues of 1.48m, up 9% on the same period last year.
Bwin.party also offered an update on its planned sale to GVC Holdings, commenting that shareholder documents associated with the transaction were “well-advanced” and that the deal should complete in early 2016.
Bwin.party’s share price was up 2.1% to 108.5p at the time of writing.