Swedish online gambling operator Mr Green saw its earnings quadruple in the second quarter of 2017 thanks to new products and a tighter grip on expenses.
In an interim report released on Friday, the Stockholm-based Mr Green reported revenue rising 36.3% year-on-year to SEK 287.8m (US $34.9m) in the three months ending June 30. Earnings jumped 337% to SEK 52.4m as margins improved 12.5 points to 18.2%.
Mr Green continues to lessen its reliance on Nordic markets, which accounted for 33% of the Q2 revenue pie. While Nordic revenue was up 10.3% year-on-year thanks to its Danish market launch and good growth in Sweden and Finland, Western European markets shot up 80.5%, boosting the region’s share of overall revenue to 41%. Central, Eastern and Southern European market revenue was up 30.2%.
For the first half of 2017, overall revenue rose 31.2% to SEK 564m while earnings more than doubled to SEK 86.6m.
In a presentation accompanying the report, Mr Green CEO Per Norman credited the revenue gains to last year’s launch of new live dealer casino and sportsbook products. At the same time, the costs associated with those launches have subsided, and the company also trimmed marketing costs through “intensified focus on digital marketing and personalized customer communication.”
Q2 saw the relaunch of Mr Green’s female-focused Garbo mobile casino product and the completion of Mr Green’s acquisition of the Danish operations of Dansk Underholdning. Norman says Mr Green plans to launch its Danish sportsbook operations in Q3, which will likely lead to a temporary rise in marketing expenditure.
Mr Green raised SEK 195m through a new share issue in Q2, boosting the company’s cash and equivalents pile to SEK 463m. The debt-free Mr Green plans to use its fat stack to finance further expansion, both organically and via further acquisitions.
Mr Green is also prepping the Q3 launch of its Sportsbook 2.0 product, a new customer loyalty program and the Green Gaming predictive tool to identify potential signals of problem gambling activity.
