Media and FL Entertainment, a betting company, praised Betclic Everest’s performance during an “exceptional” 2022 financial period.
FL Entertainment is now the name of the combined business that was created through a merger with Pegasus Entrepreneurial Acquisition Company Europe. The new-look company went public in July 2022.
The merger agreement included all Betclic Everest subsidiaries including Bet-at–home. It also featured TV production company Banijay which was first merged to create FL Entertainment, before being combined with Pegasus.
Francois Riahi, chief executive of FL Entertainment, reflected on the first six month period of the combined company and said that online gaming and sports betting was “very strong” despite the high number of comparisons in 2021.
Riahi stated that 2022 was an exceptional year for FL Entertainment. “As a group we achieved strong results that were consistent with our guidance, made rapid progress towards the strategy at our listing, and strengthened our financial position.
“The football World Cup’s strong commercial performance aided in part to an increase of 25% in the number of active players.
“Betclic was the most downloaded app for sports betting in France, Portugal and Poland. It is also the second most downloaded app across Europe. This is due to our state of the art technology platform, which is the best in terms of reliability, efficiency, and usability.
“Looking ahead, we will capitalize on increased player numbers in order to drive continued organic growth and a high rate.”
Gaming and sports betting
The revenue from online gaming and sports betting was EUR835m (PS733m/$890m), a 12.8% increase over the EUR741m last year.
FL Entertainment stated that this growth was due to a strong fourth quarter and increased activity around the 2022 Fifa World Cup. The tournament, which has been moved from its usual summer date because of high temperatures in Qatar, led to a shift in FL Entertainment’s reporting. The World Cup contributed 7.5% to Betclic Group’s annual sportsbook stakes, and 31.0% to annual new sportsbook unique active gamers.
Sportsbook revenue increased 13.8% to EUR670.1m by division and Bet-at-home. This was due to a 25.0% increase in active players.
Online casino revenues rose 2.7% to EUR104.8m due to increased gamification and the introduction of new games. Cross-sell during the World Cup aided online poker revenue to rise 13.1% to EUR49.9m. Other revenue was up 60.7% at EUR10.3m.
Bet-at-home problems
Despite a difficult year for Bet-at-home, growth was achieved. After a difficult year, Bet-at home warned in September of an higher risk that it might not have enough liquidity to meet its financial obligations.
This warning was issued in the context of a substantial winding down of activities of the company in other regions, including Austria.
The business lost a legal fight against an Austrian consortium of players seeking compensation from unlicensed operators in October 2021. Bet-at-home declared that it would leave the market, and also close down the Maltese company created to target it.
Bet-at-home declared that it would withdraw permanently from the market in July 2022. This was in response to the Gambling Commission’s suspension of the operator for anti-money laundering and social responsibilities failures.
Performance of groups
Looking at FL Entertainment’s wider business, which includes the content production and distribution arm as well, revenue increased 15.7% to EUR4.05bn in 2022. The year’s content production and distribution revenues were 16.5% higher at EUR3.21bn.
The group suffered a loss of EUR4.2m before taxes due to increased spending in several areas. However, this was a significant improvement over EUR24.2m in 2021. FL Entertainment was assessed with EUR76.9m income tax. This is a net loss of EUR81.1m compared to EUR73.4m the year before.
FL Entertainment pointed out that after excluding restructuring costs of EUR127.4m and EUR147.5m for long-term incentive plan, employment-related earnout and option expenses, and EUR112.9m in other income, the net profit was EUR306.7m. This is 8.5% more than last year.
Riahi stated that FL Entertainment’s first annual results were a testament to the strength and viability of its business model. “We are well-positioned to strengthen our leading positions within our structurally growing market in 2023, and continue to show our proven ability for profitable growth at scale.”
