Betsson revenue record; Svenska Spel mutters; Sweden drops App Store purge

Swedish betting operator Betsson AB has continued its positive momentum from 2014 by posting a new quarterly revenue record.

Betsson released a trading update on Friday showing revenue up 24% to SEK 847.4m (US $98m) and net income up 42% to SEK 224.1m in the three months ending March 31. Mobile revenue was up 131% to SEK 233.3m, representing 28% of the overall pie. Betsson’s dominant casino vertical saw revenue rise 28% to SEK 585m while sports betting turnover was up 60%. Customer deposits rose 43%.

Much of the gains are attributable to the February 2014 acquisition of the Dutch-facing Oranje and Kroon casino brands but Betsson says organic revenue growth was up 14%. Betsson’s Q1 operating margin of 28.1% was its highest figure in three years.

Betsson CEO Magnus Silfverberg claimed the results validated the company’s “multi-brand strategy of migrating a number of brands to one shared technical platform.” The Techsson platform is currently responsible for 87% of group revenue and the stragglers will be migrated before the year is through. Betsson recently shuttered its DanmarksAutomaten and Maximo brands and merged their customer databases with Casino.dk and CasinoEuro respectively.