Because of the highly controversial asset shell game Caesars has engaged in over the past year or so (and which aggrieved debt-holders are furiously protesting), CAQ/CGP year-on-year comparisons are mostly meaningless, but revenue rose 31.8% to $438.7m while operating income fell 44% to $28.9m and adjusted earnings rose 19.1% to $104.9m.
Focusing on the individual online components, for the three months ending June 30, CIE reported revenue of $144.6m, up 95.4% year-on-year. This was primarily due to CIE’s market-leading social gaming operations, which are now consolidated under the Playtika brand and reported revenue up 90% year-on-year to $134.4m. By comparison, CIE’s real-money online gambling operations in Nevada and New Jersey reported a 20% sequential quarterly gain to $10.2m.
Despite those gains, CIE recorded an operating loss of $20.5m thanks in part to $31.9m in acquisition related costs and $15.5m in impairment charges from the anticipated closure of one of CIE’s development studios as it brings all its social gaming operations under one roof. CIE’s adjusted earnings rose 119% to $44m.
CIE’s social gaming metrics are heavily skewed by its February 2014 acquisition of development studio Pacific Interactive but they’re impressive all the same. Playtika managed to convert 3.2% of its total average monthly unique users into purchasers of virtual goods, which compares quite favorably with the 1.9% former social gaming kings Zynga reported in its own Q2 scorecard. CIE also reported average revenue per daily average user of 28¢ compares to Zynga’s 7¢.