Australian gambling operator Tabcorp Holdings has paid a £39.5m penalty to pull the plug on its UK-facing Sun Bets online sports betting business.

Last month, Tabcorp formally declared its intention to seek an early exit from its money-losing Sun Bets joint venture with Rupert Murdoch’s media firm News UK. Tabcorp warned at the time that it would likely be forced to ante up a significant sum to News UK for the early termination of its contract, which extended to December 31, 2019.

On Thursday, Tabcorp announced that it had agreed to pay News UK a £39.5m penalty and that the Sun Bets site would “cease trading in the coming days.” Tabcorp CEO David Attenborough said the plug was pulled after the company determined that a “material improvement” in Sun Bets’ performance was unlikely “over the next 18 months.”

Tabcorp and News UK announced their partnership in 2015 and the Sun Bets site made its debut the following year. But the site failed to catch fire with UK sports bettors and the site’s non-stop stream of red ink pushed Tabcorp to place the UK venture under review last October.