Tatts’ 6.8% revenue rise driven by digital and lottery growth

Tatts has reported a 6.8% rise in group revenues to A$743m for Q1 2018 ahead of its looming merger with Tabcorp.

The uptick was driven by strong digital growth across all three core verticals, including lottery, gaming and sport.

The firm’s lottery offering demonstrated particularly strong revenue growth, up 8.8% year-on-year across Tatts’ major draw games Saturday Lotto, Powerball and Oz Lotto.

The revenue rise was achieved in part thanks to eight jackpots in the quarter reaching the “influential” A$15m mark. Tatts achieved strong digital lotteries sales growth, up 29.6%, with digital sales nw representing 16.4% of total lotteries sales.

Revenue from MAX, Tatts’ gaming services business, was also up 4.7% on the prior corresponding period after benefiting from a monitoring price increase in New South Wales.

Fixed price turnover for the firm’s sports betting business UBET also continued to grow strongly, with racing turnover up 10.8% and sports turnover up 10.3%, although this was offset by the long running migration of win and place betting from the tote, which saw tote turnover decline by 6.7%.

Performance from Tatts’ digital wagering channel continued to show strong growth, up 15.8%, with total digital turnover now representing 34.3% of all turnover.