Bwin.party Poker Revenue Falls in First Half of 2015

Gaming company bwin.party released their half-yearly results this week, and the numbers for poker are less than stellar. In what is a further sign that online poker continues to be in a state of general decline, the company’s poker operations reported €33.9 million (around US $37.9 million) in revenue for the first half of this year.

That was a 23.1% fall from bwin.party’s €44.1 million revenue that it posted for its poker operations in the first half of 2014. One of the main trends that has contributed to the sharp decline in poker revenue has been the drop in online poker traffic throughout the year.

Bwin.party’s largest online poker network, partypoker, has traditionally been a top five network in terms of player traffic, and it once constantly boasted player averages of between 1500 and 1600. However, those days now seem long gone.

According to PokerScout, partypoker currently has a seven day player average of 950, which represents a drop of over a third throughout 2015. Partypoker’s French domain also is not faring so well, with a current seven day average of 475 players.

Bwin.party also sold one of its most prized poker possessions, the World Poker Tour (WPT), to Ourgame in June for US$35 million. It was then announced that the company itself was to be purchased by 888 Holdings, although 888 has now been engaged in a bidding war with GVC to buy bwin.party despite this recent income report.

Although news of the decrease in poker revenues for bwin.party is not welcoming, it is certainly not surprising given the current state of the online poker market. However, bwin.party is in a good position to turn those numbers around due to both its size and influence in the poker industry.

Revenues were also down in most of bwin.party’s other gaming divisions. The company’s sports betting and casino & games revenues decreased by €16.3 million and €4.9 million respectively.

Bwin’s bingo division reported a slight year-on-year increase, however, with €26.9 million in revenue recorded for the first half in 2015 as opposed to the €26.7 million recorded in 2014. Total revenue for the company was €296.5 million (around US$331.5 million), which was a fall from the €317.1 million (around US$354.5 million) reported in the first half of 2014.