Sportingbet trumps rivals with poker site |
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Published
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Thu, 13 Oct 2005 19:05
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LONDON: Whoever had predicted that online gaming will not last long may have to eat their words. But then gaming firm Sportingbet is happy they weren’t listening when they bought the Paradise Poker site last November.
In a conference call, chief executive Nigel Payne said the poker site had beaten all expectations since it was bought and contributed one third to the firm’s record pretax profit of £40.8 million (almost five times £8.3 million earned last year) in the year to July 31.
Revenues from the firm’s other two businesses - sports betting and casino games were as impressive raising hopes for the sector and silencing cynics and rivals who had predicted the demise of the poker site.
Collections from poker have grown 22 percent quarter-on-quarter and surged 71 percent during the last 10 weeks. The firm recorded a 66.3 percent rise in the average number of games played each day on their site. Payne said a lot of operators “are very pleased” about how the online poker business has progressed.
Investors are equally upbeat as gambling stocks staged a minor rally advancing 6.5 percent. Sportingbet’s leading rival Partygaming rose 9.7 percent to 78.5p; Empire Online surged 8.8 percent to close at 111p and the newcomer 888 also gained 3.4 percent.
The trading activity and upbeat mood has prompted analysts to revise their 2006 expectations by at least 10 percent.
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