William Hill, one of the leading bookmakers on the territory of the UK, published a special trading statement of its website, revealing its expectations for its annual performance over the unaudited 52 week which ended on December 27th, 2016.
The UK-based company is expected to officially announce its final 2016 annual results on February 24th, 2017.
The Interim Chief Executive Officer of the company Philip Bowcock commented on the bookmaker’s trading results, highlighting the improvement marked by William Hill in its Online and Australian divisions over the second half of the fiscal year. The UK bookmaker’s boss also explained that the growth registered in the afore-mentioned units had continued in recent weeks.
According to the statement of Mr. Bowcock, all four divisions of the operator had posted “customer-friendly results” at the end of the previous fiscal year. In fact, the profits generated by the company’s units was £20 million below William Hill’s initial expectations. However, the Interim Chief Executive Officer predicted that the management team of the company remained confident that William Hill would manage to improve its performance in 2017, especially considering the fact that the key underlying trends were reported as positive.
According to the press release, published on William Hill’s website, over the nine weeks since the company’s trading statement made in the mid November 2016, the wagering trends were still corresponding to the ones which were reported previously. The company also revealed that the gross win margins were lower than initially expected mostly because of the unfavourable football and horseracing results which had negative impact on the entire business sector in December 2016.
All this resulted in the Group revealing that its 2016 annual operating profit was expected to approximately amount to £260 million, which was at the bottom end of the company’s initial expectations of operating profit in the range from £260 to £280 million.
This is not the only news around the British bookmaker. Last week, the company announced that it has joined forces with Caesars Entertainment in order to reestablish pari-mutuel simulcast wagering to the Horseshoe Council Bluffs Casino. Such an agreement will provide William Hill customers with the opportunity to place bets on the key tracks in the country, including Harness, Greyhound and Thoroughbred, on a weekly basis.
As revealed by the company, the William Hill Race Book is expected to be open before the 2017 edition of the Kentucky Derby due to the construction schedule and pending regulatory approval. The Chief Executive Officer at the US division of William Hill Joe Asher said that everyone at the unit were very happy with the opportunity to expand their operations in Iowa. He also shared their pride of the fact they would be joining forces with Caesars Entertainment.
As previously reported by the Casino Guardian, the UK-based bookmaker had a challenging 2016. The current fiscal year would be an important one for William Hill, as the company is expected to continue working on its global presence, consolidating positions and on all of its divisions’ growth.
- Author
Olivia Cole
