Betsson AB
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Betsson AB
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Good morning, and welcome to today's presentation of Betsson's second quarter. My name is Anna-Lena Astrom, and I will be handling the Q&A session later after the presentation. But first, of course, we will hear from Betsson's CEO, Pontus Lindwall; and CFO, Martin Öhman. [Operator Instructions] But first, now Pontus, the stage is yours.
Thank you. Hello, everybody. Welcome to the presentation of the second quarter 2020 of Betsson. So here is an outline of what we want to cover today. We're going to start with an overview, and then we're going to discuss how online entertainment is resilient to crisis. Then we're going to get the financial overview from Martin, and then we will give you a trading update for the third quarter. And then I will talk about product and technology update and regulations and sustainability and growth drivers and summary. And after that, we will open up for Q&A. So an overview of the quarter. Some financial highlights. We had all-time high revenues of SEK 1.5 billion, and we had organic revenue growth of 12%. We had an EBIT of SEK 218 million, which is an 11% increase compared to last year and quite a strong EBIT margin of 14.2%. Our Casino revenues were up 40% compared to last year, whereas the Sportsbook revenues were down 34%, of course, impacted by the COVID-19 effect.
It's Anna-Lena Astrom, again. Is this something that you're satisfied with? Or did you expect this going into the quarter?
Going into the quarter, the visibility was very low on how the quarter was going to play out. So looking back now, I'm really satisfied with what we have achieved. And in such tough conditions, we have managed to deliver a very strong profit, which puts us in a strong position going forward. So speaking about that, our strong position, we have continued all our efforts in the company despite the ongoing crisis in the global markets. This means that we continue to strive forward, and we have fulfilled the integration of the GiG B2C vertical that we acquired. We have made a move into the U.S. through a corporation in Colorado. We are going to Kenya, into the African market. And we have -- after the quarter, we have made an acquisition of 70% of ColBet in Colombia. So online entertainment resilient to crisis. This graph shows that we've had many crisis since the early 2000s. And on the bars, we can see that the online gambling market is really resilient to all those crisis. And that's, of course, an interesting and good position to be in. When it comes to our company, Betsson, we are very resilient due to the fact that we have a very diversified product portfolio, a diversified brand portfolio, and we have a broad geographical spread and a strong financial position. So this makes us strong for any kind of changes in the market.During this period, we have been working remotely, and we are still working remotely. And due to the technological infrastructure that we have, this is working really well. Of course, we see an uplift in the casino during the COVID crisis, and we see an accelerated transition from retail to online gambling. The sports betting took a hit, as I mentioned before, by the end of the first quarter and the first half and even a little bit more in the second quarter, but now it's returning to normal at the end of the second quarter. So we will keep on building for the future, and we keep on all the initiatives that we have started and look forward to the future. So now I'm going to hand over to Martin for a financial overview.
Yes. Thank you, Pontus. Pontus will be back in a few minutes to wrap up the presentation. But first, of course, we will have Martin Öhman with us here to go through the numbers. Martin, Q1 started out quite strong with positive momentum in the Sportsbook specifically. But then as we all know, COVID-19 hit the world and us in Europe very hard, shutting down most sports in a lot of the countries. With that fresh in mind, what's your take on the Q2 numbers?
Thanks, [ Ola ] for the introduction. Yes, we were on a good trend at the end of the Q, first quarter. And we're now entering the second quarter, we are still on a good trend, and we see the third consecutive quarter with growth quarter-over-quarter. Revenue for the second quarter was, as Pontus mentioned, SEK 1.5 billion, which is an increase by 20%, of which 12% is organic. And the increase comes mainly from Casino, where we see all-time high in the second quarter 2020. License revenue from our sustainable B2B business grew by -- grew from SEK 121 million last year to SEK 209 million this year and now corresponds to some 14% of the group's total revenue.Looking at revenue by quarter. We see increase in all regions but the Nordic region, where we see a decrease by 14% organic, and this is all due to the lack of sporting events. Casino revenue is slightly up in this region, but it's not compensating as it does in the other regions for the shortcomings from sports. Revenue from Western Europe increased by 40%, of which 20% was organic and now constitutes some 36% of the group's total revenue. The Western Europe region is a casino-heavy region where we find countries like U.K., Italy and Netherlands, where we historically have seen quite a lot -- quite high number coming from the online -- from the land-based and now transforming to the online. We've also seen harder restriction in those countries than maybe in other regions impacting this a bit and sort of accelerating the online transition. Both the CEECA region and the rest of the world region are Sportsbook-heavy regions. So it's extra fun to see that we see growth from those regions as well. Revenue from regulated markets increased by 30% compared to the same period last year and now constitutes some 40% of the group's total revenue. Betsson's current casino offer includes some 3,000 games, of which 2,500 are available on mobile devices. And as mentioned, Casino increased by 40% in the second quarter, and this is all-time high. And we also see that casino grow for the fourth consecutive quarter, and this is mainly due to additional games and features, improved products, such as the Pay n Play Casino, Gala Casino in Sweden. We have also seen the shift from off-line to online and sort of the lockdown and social distancing as well. Moving on to the Sportsbook. Gross turnover in Sportsbook was some SEK 1.4 billion, which is a decline by 16% organic compared to second quarter last year. And the decline could have been much bigger since the sort of nonexisting sporting in the beginning of the quarter. But thanks to our proprietary Sportsbook, we've been able to sort of shift our focus, and we have offered some 63,000 live betting events during the quarter. Sportsbook revenue declined by some 34% compared to same quarter last year, and this is, of course, impacted by the lower gross turnover. But also to the lower Sportsbook margin of 6.9% compared to 7.8% last year. The 8-quarter rolling average margin was 7.4%. Cost of services provided in the second quarter increased by SEK 155 million. And this is mainly explained by the change in revenue mix since revenue from the Casino side comes with a higher cost of service provider than our proprietary Sportsbook. Gross profit amounted to SEK 959 million compared to SEK 859 million last year and corresponds to a gross margin of 62.5%. Marketing spend is more or less on the same level as last year, and we have seen a shift towards more casino-related marketing. And as always, we try to sort of get the most out of every spent krona. That's why we can be quite efficient in marketing. Betsson have managed costs very tightly in the last few quarters and that we will continue with. Personnel and operating costs has slightly increased in the second quarter compared to last year. But this is part of the growth plan, and we have invested and will continue to invest in developing our technology, broadening our product offering and also improve the user experience. You should also keep in mind that we have added the GiG business, adding on some new 60 employees to the business from mid-April this quarter. Operating cost in the second quarter is also impacted by nonrecurring items of SEK 20 million relating to a fine received from the Swedish Gaming Authorities, which Betsson has appealed. EBIT amounts to SEK 280 million, which is an increase of 11% year-over-year, and EBIT margin is 14.2%. And that conveys Betsson's ability to deliver profit, although tough times. Organic EBIT, adjusted for unrealized FX losses of SEK 17 million and the SG&A fine of SEK 20 million amounts to SEK 283 million, representing an organic EBIT margin of 18.5%. Moving on to the cash flow and financial position. Betsson has a high cash conversion ratio and showed operating cash flow of SEK 344 million, driven by strong operating income in the quarter. This is a bit lower than last year. Since last year we're quite positively affected by changes from working capital. Cash flow from financing activities mainly relates to the acquisition of the GiG's B2C operation, but also to investments in Betsson's proprietary technology. Cash flow from financing activities is purely relating to utilization of the RCF due to the payment of the purchase price for the GiG business. Betsson has a low leverage. And as of end of June, the net debt position amounted to SEK 160 million, corresponding to a net debt-to-EBITDA ratio of 0.1, and we have an equity ratio of 63%.
Perfect. Thank you, Martin. Martin will of course be staying for the Q&A session and answer questions, if necessary. But first, we'll welcome Pontus back to wrap up the presentation with a few more slides.
Thank you. Yes, so I'm going to talk about the trading update in the third quarter, where we see an uplift until the 16th of July with 35% out of which 23% is organic compared to the full third quarter last year. This is, of course, a very powerful number. But it's only a short way into the quarter, and it's hard to have a long-term or midterm outlook for the quarter. But I think we can conclude that we are performing strongly. And with the sports coming back and the casino being -- keeping on strongly, I feel that we are in a strong position so far in the quarter. So a little bit on the product and technology. As I said before, Betsson has not stopped to invest or to develop. It's in the other way. We have continued to strive forward, and we have done several launches of new technology pieces during the quarter, mostly are related to the Sportsbook such as increased number of markets and some user experience improvements. We have added features such as to go early payout in the Sportsbook and several other new technological things also payout by Swish in Sweden is one of those. On the regulatory and sustainability side, I just want to comment on a few updates. The Netherlands needs to be commented all the time. And this time, the parliament has proposed that online operators will not be permitted to use their preestablished Dutch customer bases once the market open up, which is planned to be this time next year. In Sweden, the government has implemented a temporary restriction policy from the 2nd of July, just recently hitting mainly casino players. And in that, there was measures for the COVID implemented, but they have been taken away since the 10th of June.
Pause for a second about the Netherlands thing there. Could you give maybe some more flavor? What would that mean? Or wouldn't you like to speculate on that so early
Yes. If that would happen according to the proposal, it means that operators -- online operators would have to start off with a clean customer base when the market opens up. And of course, this is something that we will -- we don't like this proposal at all, and we will work against this proposal. So during this sad time of COVID-19, we have activated our responsible gaming measures even more. And we have more than doubled the contacts with the interactions with customers in responsible gaming questions, and we have doubled the real-time notifications to customers in this regard as well. And from the new depositing clients that we have had in the quarter, more than 40% have started out with a deposit limit on their accounts. So we are moving ahead and being -- we are working even more strongly in responsible gaming than ever before.So what are the growth drivers for Betsson? And why have we been able to perform this well? And I think the key enablers for our growth is that we have the proprietary technology. We have the scale to scale up for the future. And this proprietary technology makes it possible for us to adjust very quickly to changes in the market conditions. We have strong financials to deliver growth. So that gives us a freedom to act in several different areas. We have a very diversified business through a multi-brand portfolio, many brands, many markets, many products, and that makes us strong and resilient. We enjoy the transition from land-based gaming to online gaming, which has been increasing, of course, during this COVID crisis. And most important of all, we have the operational excellence with all the passionate Betssonites out there, and I think we have the best working crew in this industry. So to summarize, I'm happy, we have an all-time high revenues in this hard period of the year. We have -- during this hard period, we have also made several new market entries like the U.S., Kenya and Colombia. And we have proven once again that we are resilient, and we are primed for both organic and acquisitive growth for the future.
Perfect, Pontus. That means it's time for questions. [Operator Instructions] With that, I'll hand the word over to our phone operator, Jody.
Our first question for today is from the line of Martin Arnell.
Can you hear me?
We hear you loud and clear. I hope you can hear us, too.
Yes. Great. So my first question is on the revenue growth in the quarter and the mix there with strong Western Europe and perhaps a bit weak Nordics. If you could elaborate a little bit more on the markets in Western Europe. Is it wide good performance across U.K., Italy, Netherlands, Germany, et cetera?
Yes. It's wide, good performance, and it's very natural that you see a stronger push on those markets than you see in the Nordics because the Nordics has a higher penetration already of online gambling, whereas in the Western Europe countries, they are more used to land-based gaming. And when that disappears, there is a stronger push into online gaming for that reason.
And I know Nordics is not your main market anymore, but how are you reacting to these temporary restrictions? What are you doing to offset that?
Yes. We still have strong ambitions in the Nordics. It's an important part of our business, and we want to be strong here. We didn't like this implementation of new regulation, which we think is based on -- it's not based on any science. And we think the response to the COVID crisis is way too late, and that is also proven by the fact that other countries have removed their measures already. But we will continue. As before, we have launched the strong Jalla Casino during the quarter, the casino with Jalla. And we have great hope for the Nordic markets despite the fact that we now have an even more complicated situation in Sweden.
And on the Realm numbers, how is that possible in a quarter like this with canceled sports events? Is it -- have you pushed casino there? Or how can you explain that?
We have seen natural transition from sports to casino during this period. And we believe that there is an effect as well that probably land-based venues has closed down, and that has pushed new players into the digital market.
Okay. And the trading outlook, is that number -- does that include faded casino growth compared to the end of Q2? Or is it continued strong casino in that number?
It's -- I can't give the details on the figures, of course. But I can only say that we have started the quarter strongly in most areas.
Okay. And just final 2 questions. Your expansion plans, when do you expect to have decent U.S. revenue streams?
As we have said before, we are going into the U.S. in a cautious fashion. And we're going to establish ourselves there during the next year. I can't reveal any details on our U.S. plans. But of course, we are -- we will be happy to see a lot of potential in that market, selling our Sportsbook through B2B arrangement. And depending on the outcome, it can become pretty big figures. The U.S. is planned -- is expected to become one of the biggest markets if not the biggest in the world.
Okay. And final one for me. On the GiG acquisition, could you just remind us on the synergies and potential timing for this?
Yes. Now we have taken over the business. It's up and running with an additional 60 people, and we're really happy about that, and it's performing according to plan. In -- we have communicated to the market already that we will be operating on the GiG platform for another 2.5 years. And after that time has passed, then there will be another set of synergies when we go onto our own platform.
Our next question is from Oscar Erixon.
A few questions from me, starting with the trading update for July, very strong organic growth. How should we view growth for the full quarter? I mean currently, the sports calendar is very busy. But of course, most proper leagues will now not be active in August and then the next season will start mid-September. So how should we view the full quarter growth? Do you have any input on that?
Yes. Of course, it's impossible even for us to paint that out in detail. As we say, we have seen a very strong start of the third quarter, we expect it to keep on strongly going forward. There will be a bit less sports events at some period of time during the quarter. But we don't expect a very big drop down. So we expect the quarter to keep on strongly.
Okay. Great. And could you say something about the Sportsbook margin at the start of Q3? Is there anything out of the ordinary or is more volumes and activity that's driving it?
I would say nothing that stands out.
Got it. Looking at Sweden, specifically at the start of Q3, I think, is particularly relevant given the new deposit limit rules, especially. What patterns are you seeing in Sweden? And do you say if Sweden grew year-on-year at the start of July? And how it compares to the rest of the group?
It's too short of a time period since the introduction of the new set of regulations in Sweden to have any judgment. But what we can say on a general note is that any kind of limitations that you put or any kind of restrictions will put -- push further players out of the regulations. So that's not good. But from a Betsson view, we have a strong ambition in Sweden, and our ambition is to grow in Sweden in the future.
And with regards to your ambitions, do you -- what type of judgments are you making when it comes to allocating marketing spending between Sweden and other markets? Will that change now post-2nd July?
I can't comment on that. That's a detailed question, which I can't go into here.
Understood. And final question on Sweden. You see a different pattern among your brands with, I guess, Jalla Casino being more focused on Pay n Play, for example?
Yes. I think I can say that we are satisfied with the start of Jalla Casino. It has taken off really well. So we can say that the market has surely appreciated the product, and that's very encouraging.
Understood. And then a question on Q2 numbers. The rest of world region for Casino grew very strongly at 240% year-on-year, really stood out. Can you talk about the mix there? Is Peru the main driver? And if so, how do you view the outlook in Peru where you seemingly have a strong market position?
Yes. That's our strongest market in that region. And I think the driver behind the Casino growth in that region is the same driver as we see in, for instance, Western Europe. It's less -- it's not possible to play in retail shops. That pushes people to online casino. And it's not possible to play -- it was not possible to play on sports most of the quarter, and that also pushed players to the casinos. So it's a similar pattern as in other regions. And in terms of the outlook for the region as such or Peru, Betsson has, of course, high ambitions with that region, which you can see from the investment that we did in ColBet recently.
Excellent. And the final question here from me. There's news out today that U.K. tax authorities have started a probe into GBC for bribes to improve the operations in Turkey. What have you heard about this? And could it, in some way, impact Betsson and Realm Entertainment as well? Any input will be interesting.
Yes, we heard that news as well this morning. It's a matter regarding another company. It's not related to our partner. And you also have to keep in mind that Betsson is a technology supplier to an operator in that region. And I think we are pretty far away from what's going on in the U.K. investigation.
And our next question is from Erik Moberg.
Can you hear me?
Yes, we hear you. I hope you hear us, too.
Yes. All right. Could you perhaps elaborate a bit more on your strategy within B2B Sportsbooks? You indicated that you want to start to provide B2B Sportsbooks services in the U.S. And do you perceive that you will have to increase your investment in order to keep up pace with competitors that are solely focused on B2B offering?
Of course, there will be some investments in relation to that. We have already geared up for that to go to -- into B2B on the technical side. Regardless of that, we have managed to increase the competitiveness of our Sportsbook for the past few years with the current setup that we have. So I don't see any draconic cost changes by going B2B with the Sportsbook.
Got it. And to follow up on the B2B Sportsbook. When you entered Spain, you used BetConstruct as a B2B supplier for your own Sportsbook. My take is that U.S. is much more stricter in terms of compliance. But do you assess that your current Sportsbook offering currently is able to scale into new states?
Yes. We are. I mean, we can't go into every single state in the U.S. tomorrow. But I think we will start out in Colorado. And we will have time to adopt to other markets, which ones we didn't fit for our Sportsbook.
And there are currently no further questions from the phone lines.
Thank you so much, Jody. I'll try to ask a few questions myself. Here's one we got inviting on the site. It's a question where you're asked to please elaborate on the GiG deal. How has the brands performed in Q2? Is it better or worse than expected?
We find that the brands that we acquired have performed according to plan. And of course, the plan was good for us. That's why we made the acquisition. So we are so far happy with where we stand with GiG on the performance.
Okay. And looking at your growth initiatives right now, the company might seem to be going in multiple directions at once. Could you elaborate on what your strategy behind this is?
Yes. You see a lot of growth initiatives, and Betsson has the ambition to be a global player and a big player. And we have communicated for a long time that we are going into the U.S. in one way or another. And now we did it. We have been present in South America for some time, and now we are expanding there, which you could possibly expect because we are already there. And we now go towards the African market, which we look at as a very interesting market. It's a young market with a young population, huge interest in sports and not that well penetrated. So I think this is in line with our strategy to become a strong global internet gaming player.
Yes. And also, going back a bit to the B2B Sportsbook offering. What will be your key selling points here? Why should an operator choose to go with Betsson?
We have seen on the casino supplier side that there's a demand from operators to have several suppliers, and there are not that many competitive Sportsbook suppliers. So we believe that just the fact that we have a highly competitive and high-performing Sportsbooks that gives us a well-deserved place in that market.
Okay. And also talking about U.S. entry, you're writing in the report and calling it a first and cautious step. But with this Klondike-like gold rush, we see towards the U.S. market right now. Can one afford to be cautious? Or should you go full-steam ahead? And could you elaborate on your take on that?
Yes. I think even though a lot of things are happening in the U.S. and probably now faster after the corona crisis, that market has a long way to go still. It's still developing, and there's a lot of states that has not yet implemented any regulation. And there will be a lot of possible business opportunities over there. So I don't think that we are late to the party. We enter in a way where we are in full control of the situation, and we take the risk, which is in line with our risk appetite. So I'm really happy with this way of going into the U.S.
Okay. Perfect. I have one last question here. It's about sporting events in Q2. Considering that most sporting events were shut down during Q2, one could expect maybe that the revenue from the Sportsbook being down more than it was. Could you elaborate a bit on the customer behavior in the Sportsbook market in the second quarter?
Yes. Of course, there was not too many Sportsbook events available for a period of the second quarter. The company managed to find all different sports that was available and where we could get live streaming, and we implemented a lot of new betting opportunities on these sports. So I think some of the players, they were experiencing new sports, which they hadn't tried out before and possibly, they liked it. And now when the more normal and more broader sports are coming back, I think that people are going back partly to play on soccer and what they are used to. But I still think that some people will keep on playing on eSports and this new kind of sports that we introduced.
Okay. Very interesting. That was the last question. So if you don't have anything to add, I would -- do you have anything to add?
Yes. I just want to thank all the Betssonites out there. You have done a terrific work. I haven't seen you for a long while because we're all working from home, except us today. But thanks a lot. You have done a fantastic quarter.
Okay. Thank you so much. And that will conclude today's presentation, and we hope to see you again next quarter. Thank you.