Bwin Revenue Up 17.7% In Q3 2010 But Profits Down

Online gaming giant Bwin has just posted a €6.0 million net loss for the third quarter of 2010, despite recording a 17.7% increase in its total revenues compared to the same period in 2009.
The Austrian online betting giant saw its total revenues rise from €92.3m in Q3 2009 to €108.7m a year later, as a result of solid developments in its sports betting, games and poker offerings.
However, Bwin’s results were impacted by what it describes as “one-off expenses associated with the market entry in France and preparations to take advantage of forthcoming regulation in a number of jurisdictions.”
Bwin poker saw  the biggest increase in its Q3 2010 results, up 44.2% to €33.3 million. This was due mostly to Betfair joining the Ongame Network, as well as the company now owning a 23% share in the Italian market following its acquisition of Italian poker operator Gioco Digitale in 2009.
Bwin are also hopeful of being equally as successful in the French market, and have already seen a 70% increase in the number of its active poker customers over the past five months.
Earlier this year, Bwin and PartyGaming agreed to merge and form the world’s largest online gaming business. Looking forward, the company is confident of the advantages it will gain as a result of the planned merger and commented that it would “create competitive advantage due to synergies and scale in a multi-jurisdictional regulated market environment.”
Germany represents one of Bwins’ potentially most lucrative jurisdictions, and the company expressed optimism that Germany would soon develop “modern regulations for online gaming.”
Bwin claims that 95% of gambling revenues in the country comes from unregulated providers, with Bwin CEO Norbert Teufelberger arguing that:
“effectively preventing gaming addiction can be achieved only by a licensing model in which the granting of licenses is linked to compliance with suitable standards of gambler protection.”
Bwin shares are currently trading at €32.18 and the company has a market capitalisation value of €1,157.09 million.