Bally’s reports international operations decline despite 11% UK revenue leap in Q4
Operator also sees group revenue drop 5.1% year over year, with CEO Robeson Reeves laying out his vision for “Bally’s 2.0” following Standard General acquisition
Bally’s has reported a 5.1% year-over-year (YOY) drop in Q4 2024 revenue in what is the Rhode Island-based firm’s final earnings report as a public company after Standard General completed its acquisition in February.
Revenue stood at $580.4m, dropping from $611.7m figure reported in Q4 2023, despite UK online revenue and North America Interactive revenue growing double digits YOY.
UK online revenue jumped 11.3% YOY, with North America Interactive seeing significant growth of 24.4% YOY to $41.5m.
However, strong results in the UK failed to offset International Interactive revenue falling 9.1% to $214.5m, which, according to Bally’s CEO Robeson Reeves, was due to “ongoing weakness in certain non-UK markets.”
Adjusted EBITDAR in Q4 for its International Interactive division stood at $81.6m, a decline of 12.4% YOY and down from $93.2m the year before.
The UK remains a shining light, with sports betting being added to Jackpotjoy and Bally Casino UK last year, with the operator’s igaming proposition also remaining strong.
North America International recorded an adjusted EBITDAR loss of $12.3m for the quarter, up from losses of $9.8m the year prior.
On North America, where Bally’s runs the Bally Bet brand, Reeves noted that “segment performance was negatively impacted during the quarter by the transition to a new unified platform, an impact we expect will reverse itself in the first quarter.”
For the year ending December 31 2024, revenue amounted to $2.5bn, a slight increase from the $2.4bn recorded in 2023.
International Interactive revenue for the full year stood at $909.5m, a drop from $973.2m 12 months prior. North America’s Interactive revenue rose from $112.6m to $177.9m.
International Interactive adjusted EBITDAR for 2024 saw a slight decrease from $343.6m to $336.5m, while North America Interactive’s figure was a loss of $40.2m, shrinking from a $55.7m loss in 2023.
Commenting on the operator’s results, Reeves called fiscal 2024 a “transformational and transitional year” as he labelled the new era for the company under Standard General as “Bally’s 2.0.”
On the sale of Bally’s Asia-facing online arm last November, Reeves said: “During the quarter, we announced the divestiture of the distribution operations of our interactive business in Asia and certain other international markets to a new independently managed company.
“As a result of the divestiture, we have deconsolidated the operations and changed the accounting presentation to purely licensing revenues.
“Excluding revenue recognized from divested markets and licensing revenue recognized, International Interactive revenue grew 12.9% versus the prior year quarter, demonstrating the strong underlying financial performance of this business that is now focused primarily on regulated European markets.”
On the operator’s North American business, he added: “During the quarter we launched the Monopoly Casino app in New Jersey to very healthy customer response and launched our Bally Bet online sports betting platform in Tennessee.
“We continue to gain strong customer support for our igaming and sports product offerings which we believe will result in positive long-term performance from this segment.”
At the start of 2025, Bally’s completed the $4.6bn Standard General merger which saw it merge with land-based firm The Queen Casino and Entertainment, which Reeves said “further expanded our scale and positioned the company for compelling long-term growth.”
Marcus Glover, Bally’s CFO, added: “As we close out 2024 and begin 2025, our team is working diligently across multiple fronts to optimise our cost structure, enhance the efficiency of our operations, adopt certain best practices from Queen, and set the stage for significant long-term value creation.
“We look forward to learning from our newest team members who came to Bally’s from Queen and we’re working hand in hand with the team at Standard General to take an end-to-end look at our business.
“Bally’s 2.0 is very well positioned to deliver enhanced value for all of our stakeholders that are invested in the company’s future, and we look forward to reporting on our successes in the coming quarters and years.”
Bally’s also cancelled its investor call that was due to held alongside the earnings report. It’s remaining rollover shares still live are down by more than 20%.