bwin.party’s 2012 fails to impress

Bwin.Party’s FY 2012 results posted Friday could have been worse…but they could also have been better as taxation, poker migration problems and the continued decline of poker impacted the numbers.

Fortunately the performance of sports betting, casino and emerging businesses managed to offset the negatives to some extent, boosting actual revenues by 16 percent.

Actual revenues looked like this:

*   Sports betting Euro 262.8 million (2011: Euro 193.9 million)

*   Casino and Games Euro 268.8 million (2011: Euro 237.5 million)

*   Poker Euro 173.86 million (2011: Euro 184.6 million)

*   Bingo Euro 63.5 million (2011: Euro 58.5 million)

*   Other revenue Euro 32.7 million (2011:Euro 16.6 million)

*   Total Euro 801.6 million (2011: Euro 691.1 million)

*   Actual EBITDA was down at Euro 143.6 million (2011: Euro 155.2 million)

*   Overall gross profit in 2012 was down 18 percent to Euro 154.6 million compared to Euro 188 million in 2011.

*   Actual loss after tax came in at Euro 64.7 million, which is an improvement on the 2011 number of Euro 431 million.

Other negative developments included a decline in active player days and daily average player numbers of 23 percent, and a drop in new player sign-ups of 46 percent, although the company rationalises this by claiming that it is seeking higher value players in a “less players, more value” strategy.

The company’s termination of some major affiliate contracts will also have had an effect.

Management reported that revenue for 2013 is now expected to be slightly lower than current market estimates, but hopes to offset this by cost cutting measures and greater efficiency, leading to a performance that will be up to expectations.

Current trading in the 10 weeks to March 11, 2013 has been impacted by the less than successful dotcom migration and increased focus on nationally regulated markets with an associated reduction in marketing spend; average gross daily revenue so far is down at Euro 2.4 million (Q4-2012: Euro 2.6 million).

Nevertheless, investors in the company can look forward to a dividend up 10 percent to 1.72 pence a share, making for a total FY 2012 dividend distribution of 3.44 pence per share.

Bwin.Party hasn’t given up on poker, and says its plan to address the issue is on track with an improved poker ecology and more focus on attracting casual players rather than the experienced sharks.

Norbert Teufelberger, chief executive officer of the company, said:

“Our strategy is unchanged, but we are not relying on innovation alone to return our business to growth.  We are accelerating the pace of change by shifting our revenue mix towards nationally regulated and to-be-regulated markets.  This includes gearing up for a launch in the US, which now seems to be a more likely prospect within the next twelve months following recent events at state level.

“At the same time we are changing our approach to dotcom markets with increased focus on fewer but more valuable customers.  We are simplifying our business, moving from ‘volume’ to ‘value’, which we believe will allow us to further increase our operational efficiency. We expect this approach to generate significant additional cashflow to offset increased investment and taxes as additional markets regulate and also to fund growth in new business areas such as payments and social gaming.

“Our current trading in January and February was impacted by some user experience issues following the dotcom migration in December 2012, the impact of which was slightly higher than expected.  It was also impacted by decisions taken in January 2013 to increase our focus on nationally regulated markets and on high value customers.  The result was that gross average daily revenue was down 7 percent versus the fourth quarter of 2012 to Euro 2.4 million (Q4-2012: Euro 2.6 million).  However, Clean EBITDA margins for the same period are running higher than expected which has fully mitigated the revenue shortfall.

“The migration problems have now stabilised and while the user experience issues coupled with the actions taken to-date mean that 2013 total revenue is expected to be lower than current market estimates, associated cost savings mean that the Board remains confident about the full year result.”

In related news, Reuters reports bwin.party digital entertainment’s chief executive officer Norbert Teufelberger is confident on the company’s prospects, buying 204 000 shares today (Friday) at a price of 143.34p. The Director now holds 12,502,427 shares.

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