Paris gaming clubs on the edge
Political uncertainty could see capital's seven clubs close on 31 Dec
Good morning, on Gaming & Co today:
Collateral damage: Gaming clubs in Paris face super stressful end of year due to France’s political uncertainty.
Groupe Partouche revenue growth and renovations, Gambling.com acquires OddsJam diversify revenue streams. Super Group raises guidance as President announces departure.
Sweden: CEO of iGaming trade group says Svenska Spel should stop dictating regulations.
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Paris clubs hit by government upheavals
Lack of French government could lead to very serious consequences for Paris gaming clubs
Surreal… and depressing: Kafkaesque is a description used for unexpected and surreal situations occurring because of unintended consequences or scenarios that no one could have planned for. The tough and seemingly terminal spot Paris’s gaming clubs find themselves in two weeks before the end of the year definitely fits that bill. The French capital has seven cercles de jeux offering table games, but no roulette or slots.
President Macron is receiving the centrist MP François Bayrou this morning and a new PM should be announced later today, but the lack of a draft Budget remains the sticking point.
The clubs launched in 2018 as part of an experiment to assess the impact of having gaming establishments in the capital, rather than in tourist and spa towns where casinos are usually based.
The experiment period finishes on 31 December and the clubs, which were due to be made permanent fixtures on Paris’s gambling scene, will instead have to put the key under the mat on that day.
This is despite the operators and the Ministry of the Interior, which oversees the clubs, agreeing on the experiment’s success and that they should continue their activities.
Dissolution despair: The reason for the closures is the dissolution of the National Assembly by Emmanuel Macron in the summer and last week’s censure of France’s government.
Outlaw: A law that would have officialised the clubs’ legal standing was being worked on during the summer, but this can not happen without a draft Budget, which is not going to happen in 2024.
Serious consequences: At risk are 1,500 jobs. Some clubs will try to find a way to keep operating in the hope that a new Budget text can be drafted quickly, but the situation is impossible to predict.
In the wake of the news, PokerStars has cancelled the European Poker Tour Paris event that was scheduled for February at the Club Barrière. The group said “the current uncertainty surrounding licensing requirements has left us with no alternative”.
Grégory Rabuel, CEO of Groupe Barrière Groupe and Chairman of the trade body Casinos de France, said: “We support all club operators on the eve of this disaster and we want to believe that it can still be avoided. Exceptional circumstances call for measures that must be taken as a matter of urgency. We call on the public authorities to help us.”
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Online growth drives Partouche…
… as group celebrates renovations of major resorts
Job done: Groupe Partouche said it has completed renovations on three of its largest casinos in Annemasse and Divonne near the Swiss border and La Tour-de-Salagny near Lyon and celebrated the reopening of the Casino Royal Palm in Cannes.
Sorry for the inconvenience: The group made the announcement as its Q4 results showed a 2.5% YoY rise in revenues to €434m, with GGR rising 2.3% to €186m. Its 2024 GGR was up 1.5% to €712.3m, which the group said was “commendable given the major works carried out during the year”.
Slot machines drove most of the +1.5% growth to €504m, but electronic gaming GGR was down -1.4% to €132m.
Ex-France, GGR for 2024 was up 7.3% at €76m, the period included a favourable currency impact worth €1.5m from Switzerland, GGR at the Middelkerke casino in Belgium was up 33%.
Gambling.com’s jammin’ M&A
Sports jam: Analysts have reacted positively to affiliate group Gambling.com’s acquisition of the betting data provider OddsJam in a deal that could be worth $160m. An initial $80m will be paid upfront and a further additional $80m in earnouts until 2026 will depend on EBITDA growth.
Macquarie said the transaction “gives Gambling.com a best-in-class tech platform for real-time sports betting odds data across nearly 300 sportsbooks”.
OddsJam generated $26m in revenues and its $12m in 2024 EBITDA represents margins of 46%, implying an EV/EBITDA multiple of 6.7x.
The deal gives Gamblign.com a recurring revenue stream that is “independent of its affiliate business” and management believes OddsJam can deliver major new B2B opportunities "by leveraging their global relationships with sportsbooks and other B2B providers”.
“The transaction represents a major step toward the company's long-term $100m EBITDA target and EBITDA margins of 35-40%,” added Macquarie.
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Sweden’s BOS calls for role reversal
Government should tell Svenska Spel what to do, not the other way around says CEO of the country’s gaming trade body
Take back control: Gustaf Hoffstedt, Secretary General of BOS, Sweden’s online gambling trade group, has called on the country’s government to privatise Svenska Spel and that the state gambling company should stop telling government how it should be run.
Writing in the Dagens Industri newspaper, Hoffstedt said the privatisation of the government-owned car testing service Bilprovningen showed this was possible.
He said Finance Minister Elisabeth Svantesson’s comment that “there is no obvious reason why the state should own this company” also “applies to the state-owned gambling company, Svenska Spel”.
He added: “When Svenska Spel or its representatives weigh in and tell the government and parliament how things should be run, the democratic order is inverted. It is parliament and the government that have the mandate to dictate to Svenska Spel, not the other way around.”
Super guidance for Betway parent
Super Group enjoys strong Q4 and raises guidance
Guidance raise Richard Hasson, President of Super Group, is set to leave the company on a high after more than 13 years as the Betway parent raised its FY24 guidance from €1.5bn to €1.66bn, with adj. EBITDA set rise to €360m from €345m.
The group said the first two months of Q4 had been very strong and that although no exact leaving date for Hasson’s departure had been agreed, Super Group expects it to be during H1 2025 to enable a smooth transition of responsibilities.
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