Ladbrokes saw a modest rise in profit for the third quarter of 2012 as they ready their new online sportsbook for launch early next year. An Interim Management Statement (IMS) released this morning showed that net revenue for the group as a whole was up 3.9 percent with operating profit increasing by a minuscule 0.4 percent to £49.2million. As for the digital (online, mobile and tablet) side of things sportsbook net revenue produced a rise of 21.8 percent with net revenue for everything digital up 6.1 percent. The remainder of the digital business was disappointing with casino and games revenue up by just 1.1percent, bingo down 6.1 percent and poker continuing its decline by dropping 25.7 percent. In terms of the new sportsbook Richard Glynn, company chief executive, expects all current, and new, customers to move over to the platform at some point next year.
“We are now delivering against a clear programme to complete the rollout of the digital sportsbook and migration of customers by the end of Q1 2013, whereupon we will focus increasingly on enhanced CRM. Enhancements in trading are leading to early signs of an improvement in the quality of turnover, with further developments in pricing and liability management still to come,” Glynn said.
In the retail part of the business, revenue from gaming machines rose 11.5 percent with over the counter (OTC) posting a small rise of 0.6 percent. This was in no small part down to amounts staked OTC decreasing by 4.9 percent due to an “increase in weather affected horseracing cancellations (38 versus 2), effect of the Olympics and impact of trading enhancements”.
The stock market…well they didn’t really seem to notice the IMS as shares stayed the same and they’re, like us, waiting to see what all the fuss is about when their new online sportsbook finally gets a release.
