Poker Business News From Europe

Cash-Game Players Fall 18 Percent at 888 Poker

888.com, owner of Pacific Poker, issued a weak trading update for the period January to May 2010 saying daily average ring (cash) game players fell 18 percent.

The update indicates that, “management believes that this decline reflects industry-wide trends”.

The company said revenue had also been affected by the weakness of the euro against the U.S. dollar, the currency in which it reports.

It is expected that the forthcoming move into the newly liberalised French market will also negatively impact trading in the short-to-medium term as the company increases marketing spend in order to launch the business and gain market share.

Poker revenue in the business-to-consumer unit fell 15 percent to $12 million in the first quarter of 2010.

Winamax Poker Gets €12 Million Investment

Winamax Poker has received a €12 million cash injection from French private equity firm AGF ahead of the imminent liberalisation of the online gaming sector in the country.

Chief executive officer Marc Simoncini said the company planned to position itself as a top two online poker operator in France and the investment will be used primarily to drive marketing.

The company is based in London but is largely French-facing and counts singer and World Series of Poker bracelet winner Patrick Bruel among its
shareholders.

Paradise Poker Revenue Down 1.7 Percent

Paradise Poker, owned by publicly-quoted Sportingbet, saw third quarter revenue to end April 2010 fall 1.7 percent to £5.7 million from £5.8 million in the same period of 2009.
However the company said it experienced “good growth” in customer numbers, up 15 percent. These were acquired predominantly from cross-selling to its sportsbook.

It also said that average spend per customer in poker was being diluted by new sports customers and that while cross-selling rates were improving, this strategy attracted lower spending customers.

Average daily rake was down four percent to £61,800 from £64,100 a year earlier.
Poker now makes up nine percent of overall business revenue compared to 12 percent between February and April 2009.

Last financial year, ending July 2009, Paradise saw poker rake drop eight percent to £22 million.

Cake Poker Network in Online Partnerships

CTXM, the UK-based casino software provider, has announced it has partnered with Cake Poker Network to offer the company and network partners its suite of online casino games.

As part of the deal, Cake Poker Network will also launch two new sites, Comeon.com and AdamEvePoker.com.

Cake’s director of marketing Andrew Turner said, “We are… excited to be launching two new partners to the Cake Network in Comeon.com and AdamEvePoker.com both of which bring strong brands and unique marketing approaches. We look forward to a long and successful partnership.”

Earlier in May, Cake signed a deal with sportsbook provider EveryMatrix which will provide it with a sports betting platform.

Shares in Betshop Poker Parent Company Suspended

Shares in Leisure & Gaming, the publicly-quoted parent company of Italy’s Betshop Poker, were suspended on London’s Alternative Investment Market (AIM) in May after the company revealed it was “constrained by a lack of working capital”.

All Leisure & Gaming businesses continued to trade and the company said it was, “…in early stage discussions with a number of parties with a view to securing further funding for the business and are undertaking a strategic review of the business which may lead to a disposal of certain businesses and assets in its portfolio,”

It also said it did not expect an offer to be made to buy out the company.

Betshop Poker was a strong performer for Leisure & Gaming last year in Italy with around 13,500 regular players and gross online poker rake of €6.6 million.

iPoker to Host State-Run Poker in Finland

Playtech, the Israeli publicly-quoted online gaming software provider which owns the iPoker network, has won the contract to supply its poker platform to Finland’s Slot Machine Association, Rahaautomaattiyhdistys (RAY).

The four-year contract will see iPoker host RAY’s online poker product on the country’s new exclusive local network.

Mor Weizer, chief executive officer of Playtech, said, “This important agreement is further evidence as to the superiority of our product and the success of our stated strategy in soon-to-be-regulated markets.”

Zynga Poker Sticks With Facebook

Online poker provider Zynga has announced a five-year deal with leading social networking site Facebook.

The deal, signed in May, will see Zynga continue to supply Facebook’s millions of users with “a compelling user experience for social games”.

Zynga Poker is one of a host of games supplied by the company to Facebook. Others include Mafia Wars, Farmville, and Café World. The terms of the deal have not been disclosed.

Aussie Poker Payment Processor Pleads Not Guilty

Twenty-seven-year-old Internet tycoon, Daniel Tzvetkoff, has pleaded not guilty in Manhattan’s New York Southern District Court to his alleged role in an online payment processing scheme on the basis that poker is not gambling.

The Australian’s Brisbane-based company Intabill processed $500 million worth of transactions on behalf of online gaming operators in America, and now Tzvetkoff himself is being charged with bank fraud conspiracy, money laundering, gambling conspiracy, and money laundering conspiracy.

U.S. assistant attorney Arlo Devlin-Brown said, “The gambling industry is using the line that poker is not gambling, that it’s a game of skill and is therefore not gambling.”
Tzvetkoff’s lawyer Martin Weinberg said this is an “accurate preview” of the defence’s case.

Online Poker Firms Exit French Market


Betfair and Sportingbet, online bookmakers with significant online poker sites, have withdrawn their services from the soon-to-be-regulated French market.

In a statement about the move Betfair was critical of the licensing process saying it had not yet decided if it would apply for one as the French authorities hadn’t yet published the full requirements.

Sportingbet, which owns Paradise Poker, also indicated it would no longer allow French players to play or bet at the site saying it had a legal obligation to suspend its activities from May 13.

Other companies making the move out of France include iPoker network sites William Hill and Boylepoker.

Everest Poker Sold as Revenue Plummets

GigaMedia, owner of Everest Poker, has completed the sale of 60 percent of its gambling software business to Mangas Gaming for an initial payment of $100 million.

Mangas Gaming is jointly owned by media mogul Stephane Courbit’s Lov Group and Societe des Bains de Mer de Monaco which owns the world famous Monte Carlo Casino.

The company also owns the Betclic and Expekt online gaming businesses.

GigaMedia chief executive officer, Arthur Wang, said, “We are very pleased to join our Everest Poker business with Mangas Gaming to create one of Europe’s largest and best gaming platforms.

“Together we have the size and scale to claim top market share in the large European community, providing the highest entertainment value for our players and thereby driving the best investment value for our shareholders.”

The sale went through as GigaMedia announced its fourth quarter and full year results for 2009, which showed poker revenue down 21 percent in the fourth quarter of 2009 to $18.9 million compared to the same period of 2008.

However compared to the third quarter of 2009 poker revenue was up 20 percent in the fourth quarter.

Fourth quarter poker revenues accounted for 64 percent of the business unit’s total fourth quarter 2009 revenues while active depositing real-money customers were approximately 173,000 during the fourth quarter, up 11 percent from the previous quarter.

Ireland to Tax Online Gaming

Irish Prime Minister Brian Cowen has announced that his Government will be taxing online betting of all forms in the future.

Legislation is to be brought in which will see the introduction of licenses for overseas betting providers in order for them to be permitted to sell their products in Ireland.

Cowen said, “This will have the additional benefit of facilitating the extension of the tax regime for the betting industry to all those providing online and telephone betting and so underpin funding for the racing industry.

“Such betting must be brought within the tax net, not just because it will increase revenue, but also because it will mean that those currently not contributing to securing the future of important indigenous industries will now make that contribution.”
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