GVC H1 revenues up 8%
GVC Holdings released its interim first-half results today, with revenue up 8% on the back of strong performances from its Latam Betboo business and Italian Betaland sportsbook.
Online sports betting and gambling company GVC Holdings has delivered its first set of positive results since launching on London’s Alternative Investment Market (AIM) earlier this year with its Latin American business Betboo generating record revenues for the group in September.
GVC Holdings launched on the AIM in May, following its redomiciliation from Luxembourg to the Isle of Man last year.
GVC, owner of Betboo, an online bingo, casino, poker and sports betting site in Latin America, Italian online sportsbook Betaland and German-facing Casino Club, saw net gaming revenues rise by 8% to 28.1m for the six months ended June 30 this year compared to the same period in 2009. However, its clean EBITDA fell from 6.6m in 2010 compared to 9m last year with Keith Alexander, the company’s chief executive, blaming an increase in overall brand investment as a reason for the fall.
“We’ve had to increase our investment in our products and new brands and particularly in our casino business in Germany to protect our market share and revenue stream,” Alexander told eGaming Review this morning.
Alexander also announced a new sportsbook would launch in four additional languages including Portuguese, Turkish, Greek and Russian by the fourth quarter of this year.
“The outlook for the rest of the year is very positive. We’ve seen revenues 17% higher this quarter compared to the same quarter last year and seen strong trading in September in Casino Club which was flat last year,” he said.
“Betaland is 24% higher and Betboo 42% higher this September than last, and overall revenues are 25% higher this September. Betboo is still showing encouraging growth and meeting expectations with revenues of 2.2m, and with Q3 daily revenues of 19,000 a day compared to 12,000 compared to the same quarter last year “ this has been a record quarter for revenues.
“We have increased NGR by 8%, despite the continued economic conditions. The growth of the South American business continues to accelerate. Our strategy of continuing to pay out a dividend to shareholders of 75% of the net cash generated and investing in new high-growth businesses whilst continuing to aggressively defend our high-margin, highly cash generative CasinoClub business remains intact.”
Alexander said the business was committed to paying out a dividend of 0.10 per share to be paid to shareholders on 28 October this year.
“This is quite an important moment because many people who are following our stock thought we were abandoning our dividend policy, but we said we were committed and delivered on that commitment.”
The GVC Holdings CEO added that one court hearing had been scheduled in the Maltese court on October 14 in its legal actions against Boss Media. No date is scheduled for the Swedish arbitration.
In April eGaming Review reported that GVC was involved in several disputes with Boss regarding alleged infringement of the group’s intellectual property and the ability of Boss to terminate its contract to provide poker and downloadable casino to Gaming VC’s Italian-facing Betaland.com site.