Sportingbet has made tremendous progress during the past year, consolidating its leading position in the online sports gaming market by entering new territories and offering attractive new products to our customers. Operating profit has more than tripled to £22.7m during the year, only two years after withdrawing from the US market, which is testament to both the business model and the team within Sportingbet. Importantly, other key performance indicators such as amounts wagered, net gaming revenue, growth and yields per customer all showed significant improvements.
Regulation, of course, continues to be a significant issue in the industry but we are cautiously optimistic regarding the recent overall trend of European Governments taking a more practical approach to the industry and away from the protection of domestic monopolies. In the United States, the Group continues to be in talks with the US Department of Justice to seek clarification of the position of the US authorities with respect to the Group’s previous activities and whether a mutually acceptable resolution is possible. At this stage there is nothing further to report.
The internet gaming industry has seen another year of outstanding growth and I firmly believe that Sportingbet’s business model with its combination of strength of product offering, world leading sportsbook and high quality management team places the Group in an ideal position to capitalise on this growth. As yet we have not seen any effect from the global financial crisis nor from the anticipated economic slowdown expected in various economies. The Group’s financial position remains strong and I am pleased to report that an encouraging start has been made to the current financial year.