18 Aug: Flag drops on Sportradar IPO

Sportradar files for IPO, Sightline Payments fund raise, Tabcorp FY, Gaming Innovation Group Q2, Indian gaming revenues FY20 +More

Aug 18, 2021

Good morning. Today’s newsletter leads with the news that Sportradar has filed for an IPO on Nasdaq and Sightline Payments has completed a fundraise which officially makes it Nevada’s first unicorn. Then we have FY results for Indian gaming and Tabcorp Australia, whose divisions showed resilience in the face of ongoing COVID restrictions. Meanwhile Gaming Innovation Group’s media and affiliate divisions were the stand out Q2 performers, Newslines +More.

If you have been forwarded this newsletter and would like to subscribe, click here:

Sportradar files for IPO

The top line

Sportradar filed paperwork on Tuesday with the SEC to start the process of listing on the Nasdaq stock exchange under the ticker symbol SRAD. The listing included a placeholder offering size of $100m.

In its filing, the company said H121 revenues increased 42% YoY to €272.1m ($318.6m) with profits dropping to €18m from €20m during the same period last year.

Prize fighter: Sportradar is the latest sports data and betting services company to seek a listing following on from Genius Sports de-SPAC earlier this year. Other rivals include the to-date unlisted Stats Perform as well as IMG Arena, part of the Endeavor group which also IPO’d earlier this year with a value of over $10bn.

A-list: Sportradar’s investors include NBA owners Mark Cuban, Michael Jordan, Ted Leonsis, the NFL and the Canada Pension Pension Plan Investment Board. The company has decided to go with a traditional IPO after plans to carry out a SPAC-led listing with Todd Boehly’s Horizon Acquisition Corp. II were pulled in June. JP Morgan, Morgan Stanley, Citigroup and UBS will act as lead book-running managers for the proposed offering, with BofA Securities, Deutsche Bank Securities, Jefferies and Canaccord Genuity also on the ticket.

Sightline Payments fundraise

Unicorn spotted in Nevada: Sightline Payments has completed a new fundraising that values the business at $1bn and makes it Nevada's first homegrown unicorn. In total, $244m of new money has been raised from investors including Genting (which recently deployed Sightline’s cashless solution at the recent Resorts World opening), Cannae Holdings, Point Break Capital Management and founding investor Walter Kortschak. The new round of funding follows on from a $100m raise in April.

The end of cash: Sightline was formed over a decade ago by Omer Sattar, Tom Sears and Kirk Sanford with the aim of bringing cashless transactions to one of the last bastions of the cash economy, the land-based casino floor. “Financial Services has historically not embraced the legal, regulated gaming industry, but thanks to the innovations Sightline has fostered in the market, gaming is clearly poised for an omni-channel cashless revolution,” said Sattar.

Canny game: Cannae Holdings, run by Bill Foley, is also a major shareholder in online payments provider Paysafe where Foley is the executive chair. Said Foley yesterday: “After seeing Sightline’s groundbreaking technology firsthand at the recent launch of Resorts World Las Vegas, I am more bullish than ever about Sightline’s ability to be at the forefront of the digital transformation afoot in the North American gaming, sports, and entertainment ecosystem.”

Indian gaming revenues FY20

State of play: GGR for tribal gaming fell 19.5% in FY20 to $27.8bn with the Covid pandemic having a significant impact on tribal gaming. According to the latest figures released by the National Indian Gaming Commission, the GGR total took Indian gaming back to levels not seen since 2012. The GGR figure is an aggregate of revenue from 524 independently audited financial statements from 248 federally-recognized tribes across 29 states. Chairman E. Sequoyah Simermeyer said the fall in GGR was expected but the unknown was the long-term impact on Indian gaming.

Tabcorp FY

The top line

Group revenue up 8.8% to A$5.69bn ($4.13bn) while EBITDA before significant items was up 11.3% to A$1.1bn and profit after tax was back in positive territory at A$269m after an A$870m loss in FY20.

Lottery and keno revenues rose 9.9% to A$3.2bn while wagering and media was up 10.3% at A$2.3bn but gaming services was down 17.2% at A$183m.

More lockdowns have impacted the wagering division with revenues c. A$30-$40m though with a partial retail to digital offset. Gaming services adverse effect between A$5-$10m. Negligible effect on lottery and keno.

Digital dawn: Digital growth of 30% and 27% in the group’s lottery-keno and wagering-media respective units made up for Covid lockdown-related issues with retail. The soon-to-be hived off lottery arm achieved record revenues. However, wagering market share has fallen to 26.6% in revenue terms in H221 vs. 29.6% in H220. Recall, as part of the company’s recent strategic review Tabcorp rejected bids for the wagering division from Entain and Betmakers Technology. The lottery-keno demerger will complete in Q222.

Gaming Innovation Group Q2

The top line

Revenues were up 23% to €16.2m while EBITDA increased 86% to €5.3m.

Media services revenues hit an all-time high of €11m, up 28%. Platform services revenues were up 9% to €5.1m.

Post-close revenue up 10% (26% when adjusted for white-label closures and Germany effect).

Just superb: The affiliate media services division was the standout during the quarter and “delivered superbly”. The key metric of first-time depositors was up 37% YoT and 6% sequentially to 46.8k, also an all-time high. Of the total FTDs, 95% were on revenue-share deals. Meanwhile, affiliate media division margins hit 48%.

Haus frau: The platform business added a number of clients over the period. On the issue of Germany, where GiG said the new regulations had been a drag on divisional revenues, CEO Richard Brown was positive on the opportunities for retail operators looking to move online such as GiG client TipWin who see value there. “The question marks are more for the international operators, which is understandable,” he added. With regard to taking elements of the tech stack in-house, Brown said such moves were “often a mistake”, particularly when it comes to the “complexity” of building a PAM. Notably, Hard Rock, which intends to move to its own platform, is still operating on the GiG platform.

Newslines

Every which way: Kindred and Everymatrix have agreed a casino content deal for the US. Initially, the deal encompasses games from Everymatrix’s Spearhead Studios and Armadillo Studios with the option to add more vendors as they become available through the supplier’s CasinoEngine integration platform.

This is your captain speaking: Nuvei has announced it has signed up Carousel, the company behind the Sportsbetting.com brand which has launched in Colorado, to its full suite of payment services. Carousel, which last week also announced its MaximBet brand had received a license in Arizona, hopes to expand the Sportsbetting.com footprint into Iowa, Indiana and New Jersey. Carousel is Nuvei’s first pilot merchant in the US after the payment firm received clearance to offer services in Colorado in September last year

Spiro Gyra: Genius Sports has bought performance marketing firm Spirable which runs a platform that utilises live, contextual data and AI to distribute content across the major digital media channels including Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Snapchat. Spirable already works with a variety of gaming companies including DraftKings, Flutter, WynnBet, Betway, 888 Holdings, and Entain.

Ladies first: FanDuel has become the official DFS and sports betting partner of the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) in North, South and Central America. In a first for a women’s sports league the WTA will also feature in video highlights packages throughout FanDuel digital platforms. As part of the agreement both parties will work closely on promoting responsible gambling and the WTA has joined the National Council on Problem Gambling (NCPG).

Cashless Trax: Scientific Games has partnered with Marker Trax to integrate its cashless alternative to issuing casino markers. Players who are members of a casino’s loyalty program can apply for a Marker Trax account by signing up online or though its app. Once approved they can use an instant revolving advance line of casino credit.