The Stars Group revenues climb 31% on Australia acquisitions
PokerStars’ parent company records growth across all three core verticals, with poker up 4%cc
The Stars Group this morning reported 15% growth in its core business in Q2, with all three major verticals enjoying a positive quarter.
Poker revenues climbed 4%cc to $217m, gaming revenues were up 21%cc to $102m and sports grew 106%cc year-on-year to $20m.
When including the CrownBet and William Hill Australia double acquisition, overall group revenues climbed 31%cc year-on-year to $412m, with the Australia business contributing $61m.
“The Stars Group’s quarterly results reflect both continued organic growth within our International business and the contributions of our Australian acquisitions,” said Stars CEO Rafi Ashkenazi.
“We continued enhancing our products and user experience across all verticals and executing on our cross-selling strategy.”
“The continued emergence of our sports betting and casino offerings and the addition of our 2018 acquisitions have transformed our business and greatly enhanced the foundation and diversity of our consolidated revenue base, which will now be nearly equally split among verticals and roughly 75% locally regulated or taxed.”
Stars said the uptick in poker revenues was driven by its rewards programme and the introduction of shared liquidity in Europe, while gaming benefited from product and content improvements including the introduction of over 150 new casino games.
Meanwhile, sports benefited from to product and content improvements, the launch of BetStars in certain new markets, the 2018 World Cup.
Ashkenazi added: “We are now focused on the next stage of our transformation—integration.
“While this will be a phased and measured process, we expect that it will prepare us to not only be a leader within the world’s largest regulated markets but to also leverage the strength of our combined platform to take advantage of new opportunities and markets.”
The firm is currently awaiting CMA approval for its acquisition of Sky Betting and Gaming.
Stars Group shares climbed 1% in early trading in Toronto.