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Paddy Power Lowers Expectations

Despite reporting $69 million in profits for the first half of 2008, Irish bookmaker reveals that trading has fallen off.

Friday 29th August 2008

Dublin-based bookmaker Paddy Power has lowered its full-year earnings predictions after revealing that business had fallen off in the three and a half months since its last trading update. Last week, the Irish firm reported a ten percent increase in pre-tax profits for the first six months of the year to $69.44 million but revealed that it had since seen a string of unfavourable outcomes including wins by popular Irish golfer Padraig Harrington and good results from Irish horse trainer Aidan O'Brien. The group stated that it now expects to make an operating profit for the full year of $110.3 million compared with its previous prediction $120.8 million. “Much has happened since our last trading update three and a half months ago,” said Patrick Kennedy, Chief Executive Officer for Paddy Power. “The performance of the Irish and UK economies has deteriorated and the growth rates in our businesses have slowed accordingly. Paddy Power has always focussed on providing better value than the competition and as our customers face tighter times we have stepped this up in the last three months. “In addition, we said last year that the old adage of 'what goes around comes around' applies to sporting results and they certainly have come back around for punters since June with a string of unfavourable results for bookmakers and Irish bookmakers particularly.” In its most recent update, Paddy Power revealed that earnings per share grew by 17 percent while turnover came in at $1.57 billion. Revenues from online gaming increased 30 percent to $35.19 million driven by the strong performance of its casino and games products alongside its newer financial spreadbetting and bingo services. The company also revealed that its online poker business grew despite a 13 percent depreciation in the value of the US dollar relative to the Euro.

 


Source: OnlineCasinoNews