Every week, CasinoBeats breaks down the numbers behind some of the industry’s most fascinating stories. A number of M&A updates, Star Entertainment encountering yet more troubles, a UK system stabilisation fund and Twitch adding further context and depth to a gambling ban all form part of our latest bout of headline reflections.
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Flutter Entertainment and the Fox Corporation are in the process of a phased closure of the pair’s joint sports betting business, almost four years after the entity first came to market.
The decision to close the FOX Bet platform is being undertaken over the course of the next month, with a phasing out of operations to begin today (Monday 31 July) and last under August 31, 2023.
As a result, Flutter, which operated FOX Bet as part of the Stars Group, will retain ownership of PokerStars, in addition to one of the leading lights of the US’ sports betting space in FanDuel.
FOX will hold the right for all future usage of the FOX and FOX Bet brands, including FOX Bet Super 6, and intends to launch a new game associated with the latter later this summer.
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888 is looking to make further “significant” progress across the African continent after its part-owned 888AFRICA entity detailed the purchase of BetLion to accelerate “huge ambitions”.
The online casino and sports betting operator is currently licensed in Kenya, Zambia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and is headquartered in Nairobi, the capital city of the former. This adds a further hub for 888AFRICA, building on an existing base in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
Through the addition, 888 is expecting to drive further scale in the business, as well as deliver a notable number of new customers. BetLion counts more than three million registered users.
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Twitch added further context and depth to its ban on the streaming of gambling content, in addition to swelling its list of sites that are prohibited from the platform by two.
In October 2022, the streaming platform issued a ban on content from websites offering slots, roulette or dice games that aren’t licensed in the US or other jurisdictions that “provide sufficient consumer protection”, with an approximate 75 per cent drop in viewership reportedly felt in the immediate aftermath.
Offering an update, Twitch noted that these consumer protections include the likes of deposit limits, waiting periods, and age verification systems.
“After monitoring the update’s impact for the last year—as well as hearing directly from you—it became clear that some people were circumventing those rules, and that further steps were necessary,” a statement read.
Furthermore, a list of prohibited sites that was established almost ten months ago included the likes of Stake, Rollbit, Duelbits, and Roobet, with Blaze and Gamdom becoming the latest additions.
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Catena Media initiated a €6m sale of its UK and Australian online sports betting brands amid an ongoing focus on the North American online sportsbook and casino affiliation market and business wide strategic review.
The divestment to sports betting affiliate Moneta Communications, which itself was purchased by Seven Star Digital last year, marks “a further step forward” in refocusing the business for the aforementioned market.
The transaction is anticipated will close during the current quarter, and covers the sale of all assets in the group’s UK business, including Squawka and GG.co.uk, and all shares in the Catena’s wholly owned Australian subsidiary.
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Star Entertainment added to a lengthy list of financial penalties after being found guilty of 11 offences and being ordered to pay a A$140,000 sanction.
Following an investigation by Queensland’s Office of Liquor and Gaming Regulation, the embattled casino operator had entered a guilty plea in the Brisbane Magistrates Court earlier in the year.
Seven of the charges relate to state-wide casino legislation that prohibits the purchase gambling chips with a credit card, with $170,000 worth of wagers to this effect said to have been accepted between 2017 and 2022.
The remaining four relate to the distribution of promotional or advertising material in February 2022 to individuals that were banned or excluded from the company’s Queensland-based properties.
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MGM Resorts reaffirmed its commitment to a host of long-term growth opportunities, which include a maintained digital expansion as well as ongoing development efforts in Japan and New York.
The comments came from CFO and Treasurer Jonathan Halkyard, with the former following the Entain joint owned BetMGM venture reporting that it is on the “path to profitability” after following a US trend of achieving positive EBITDA for the second quarter.
In Osaka, the group, together with joint-venture partner Orix, have been selected by Osaka as the region’s integrated resort partner for a proposed $10bn development, with the race heating up in the Big Apple to secure one of three available commercial casino licences
This enthusiasm for future prospects followed a second quarter financial report that saw the group declare an “all-time record for consolidated net revenue”, with this metric growing 21 per cent year-on-year to $3.94bn (2022: $3.26bn).
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GambleAware began an application process to establish a system stabilisation fund to make sure gambling harm prevention, support and treatment services receive financial aid as the industry transitions to a statutory levy.
The independent charity introduced the fund to make sure organisations across England, Scotland and Wales who rely on funding streams to operate still receive the support they need.
The ‘system stabilisation fund’ will be in place as gambling harm prevention funding enters a transition period from a voluntary to a statutory levy as part of the UK government’s gambling review white paper, which was published earlier this year in April.
Last month, the UK Gambling Commission allocated almost £33m to GambleAware to form a system stabilisation fund for the transition period from voluntary funding to a statutory levy.
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Spiffbet divested its games development arm to Million Games amid decreasing focus and investment, with the group to become fully focused on its own casinos and associated services.
This will see the company end its time within this segment of the industry, citing that funding has not been sufficient to continue running the business successfully, in addition to the games having “not contributed positively over the past year.”
The transaction includes all shares in STHLM Gaming Sweden, as well as the Rhino Gaming portfolio and associated related intellectual property rights, for a fee that can amount to a maximum of SEK 3.5 million (£260,000).
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GAMSTOP reported a 12 per cent increase in sign-ups to its self-exclusion service in the first half of 2023 in comparison to the previous year, including a 30 per cent uptick in sign-ups from 16-24 year olds.
The UK’s online self-exclusion scheme stated that it saw over 48,000 consumers register for the scheme in the first six months of the year, with sign-up monthly records set in March and May.
2023’s figure for the first half of the year is a 12 per cent increase on over 43,500 reported registrants during the first six months of 2022.
Diving further into the data, GAMSTOP noted that there was a 30 per cent increase in sign-ups to the scheme from 16-24 year olds, which in total represented 21 per cent of all new registrants during the first six months of 2023.
