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PokerStars Owner buys Sky Betting and Gaming for $4.7 Billion
Tags: PokerStars, Sky Betting, United Kingdom.
Posted on 23 April 2018 by "T".

Stars Group Inc., the owner of PokerStars, has undergone a deal to buy Sky Betting & Gaming (SBG) for a whopping $4.7 billion. The move will result to the poker giant having a larger hold on sports betting, thus creating the biggest publicly listed online gambling company.

With its main headquarters in Toronto, the Stars Group shall pay in both cash and stock to the owners Sky Plc and CVC Capital Partners, according to their press release. The PokerStars operator figures it would get around 1/3 of its revenue from sports betting, the fastest-growing online gaming section, including the latest acquisitions in Australia.

CEO Rafi Ashkenazi called the acquisition ‘a landmark moment' for Stars Group, saying, "Sky Betting & Gaming's premier sports betting product is the ideal complement to our industry-leading poker platform.

The deal involves Stars Group paying $3.6 billion in cash and around 37.9 billion newly-issued common shares based on the closing price of its common stock on Friday April 20, 2018. Stars Group revealed it has obtained debt financing of around $6.9 billion which included $5.1 billion of first lien term loans, $1.4 billion of senior unsecured notes as well as a $400 million revolving credit facility. The resulting proceeds shall be utilized for the cash part of the deal and to refinance the company's existing first lien term loan as well as to repay SBG's outstanding debt.

Despite their past failure to acquire William Hill Plc (a rival of SBG), the Stars Group is now gaining a considerable foothold in the biggest regulated gaming market, the United Kingdom, and they shall definitely be enjoying numerous new signups from potential new customers for the group's online casino and poker offerings.

According to Ashkenazi, this acquisition also helps his strategy to reduce reliance on the instability of the poker business, which accounted for 2/3 of the group's revenue in 2017. He said that the Stars Group will become "the world's favorite iGaming destination".

Source:
http://www.starsgroup.com/press-center/the-stars-group-news/the-stars-group-to-acquire-sky-betting-and-gaming-for-4-7-billion-

 

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27 comments on "PokerStars Owner buys Sky Betting and Gaming for $4.7 Billion"

Displaying only the 25 latest comments. To view all comments, please visit the forum thread:
» PokerStars Owner buys Sky Betting and Gaming for $4.7 Billion


 Tony_MON7ANA23/04/2018 15:25:34 GMT
Stars Groups, the online poker industry leader, has become even bigger by purchasing Sky Betting & Gaming for US$4.7 billion. What's going to happen to Sky Poker players? Will they be able to keep their existing username after the merge?
 CALICUL23/04/2018 16:21:39 GMT
Business goes well for the amaya group and they try by other methods, to capture the market, directly by buying names in the industry of poker or betting. This is very good for pokerstars owner because they will recover the money in the future. They made the right choice.
 shokaku23/04/2018 17:04:36 GMT
Reminds a bit on the merger between bwin and Party. Also one company with the poker room and the other with the online bookie. After a good start their base started to shrink. And at least we know now, why players at Stars have to pay a higher rake. Blink
 dule-vu24/04/2018 07:03:02 GMT
we can see that poker stars owners want to have more betting market and to have lot of new sites by they ownership and they take huge matket with every site that they buy!we will see what this what will bring to players!
 doubletop77724/04/2018 07:12:33 GMT
When you read about the amounts of money involved in this deal, it does make your eyes water. $4.7 Billion to buy these companies, just goes to show the profit margin in gambling is still huge
 juppi4724/04/2018 07:20:43 GMT
Good purchase by stars but I still think the acquisition of skybet don't make them a major player in sports betting as bet365, bwin and williamhill are the giants in sports betting.
 Sorin88824/04/2018 13:50:51 GMT
The battle is for US market,betting on sports in some form is legal in four states. Sky gets a cash infusion as it is targeted for takeover by both 21st Century Fox Inc. and Comcast Corp. Stars Group took a big part of Australia’s CrownBet Holdings Ltd.( which bought the Australian unit of William Hill).Poker business look unstable for Ashkenazi,so they push casino and sport betting over poker
 godoy24/04/2018 15:49:27 GMT
what to talk now with this acquisition pokerstar will get even bigger and more focused on the game of chance because that of the more money apromesa of easy money attracts more than all poker and a sport that one has to study to learn to profit now roulette home nikel and sports betting and gambling
 Mober24/04/2018 18:48:15 GMT
A well known betting company in UK.
They have eliminated even more of the competition out there.
Good for them, but i believe it is bad for the players.
Good thing that some of the companies like William Hill, still holding....
 pochui24/04/2018 20:43:07 GMT
well 4.7 billion of dollars is really something, we are not talking about "mere" 4.7 millions here, no we're talking about 4,700,000,000 of dollars. talk about a few zeros, well I personally have only association with stars and zeros and that is a zero dollar bankroll
 bowie198424/04/2018 23:32:49 GMT
It is indeed something but not really 'something' if you know what I mean. More people will be aware how out of order gambling affects lifes the less money these comapnies will be making in the future. It is kinda futureproof business since taking/making bets is old as humanity, but I can see a strong decline in their gross profits all across the board...
 Mysik8625/04/2018 05:18:15 GMT
Posted by doubletop777:
When you read about the amounts of money involved in this deal, it does make your eyes water. $4.7 Billion to buy these companies, just goes to show the profit margin in gambling is still huge

Exactly. $4.7 Billion is so huge sum, and it show, how the poker sites earn from players. What's mean hundreds of freerolls with $1000 prize pot compared to this huge amount! Even if Stars will be offer 1000 freerolls per day with $1000 prize pot, they will spend this sum in over 12 years!!!
 dule-vu25/04/2018 09:48:37 GMT
hope that this wont be normal,that such a big companies buy other betting and gambling site,because its better when you have more bigger sites,that they fight for every player and give bigger odds and bonuses!
 Gerimantas25/04/2018 16:24:30 GMT
Wow so much money in gambling business, this is because people lose a lot of money i think. Of course now pokerstars not very good poker room so maybe they are not good owners for this company
 godoy25/04/2018 16:32:32 GMT
with this purchase the ps will become a once more a monopoly efara with the sports betting which has been making strings with poker since since Aymara assumed the ps the poker was thrown in the trash and gave place to all that and against poker leading the site for the world of gambling now is complete the gg poker sheik that the new world will come from gambling odds
 dule-vu26/04/2018 11:33:19 GMT
now you can imagine how much money people lose on gambling,when they can buy just one site for this kind of sick amount and then that they know that will return this investment and that will earn money from it!its just sick!
 CALICUL26/04/2018 16:24:10 GMT
It's normal to expand when you make money. In addition amaya group has to win here with taxes to the state. Instead of entering to budget of Canada they buying another business. This is investment: Full tilt, Sky Betting and Gaming and i think PKR is also of pokerstars owner.
 Mober26/04/2018 21:21:47 GMT
No matter what changes have happened the last few years, all over the planet,
gambling is till and will be a huge industry.
The only reason for the changes was, to rearrange, in which pockets the money goes.
 ligador3727/04/2018 04:08:15 GMT
The amount of money that drives this betting business is impressive. Pokerstars wants to cover everything! He is still a kid when it comes to sports betting, but little by little he will get his place. Unfortunately I do not know if it will be so good for the players. They will attract many and I think that less and less they will worry about the users, if they ever did.
 Gerimantas29/04/2018 16:17:17 GMT
For many players it is not very good to have a lot of companies with one owner, this is because many promotions not offer because it is not good business for owner. So like player i think it is not good news
 CALICUL30/04/2018 16:28:11 GMT
If pokerstars did not steal so much money from the players with various commissions that have increased or another methods then things will change for the better. I understand they stay pretty good in this industry but if they do not do something for the players, then they will suffer a lot. They buy completely different competitors but that does not help too much if they do not have a good tactic for amaya and his clients.
 pajalnick30/04/2018 19:07:21 GMT
PokerStars takes various attempts to occupy a leading place in the world of online games ..... Seeing in the example, a lot of poker rooms that also accept rates Pokstaroz decided to keep up with their competitors ..... the way is probably right but the most important thing is what will be the odds
 bowie198401/05/2018 00:09:56 GMT
Posted by ligador37:
The amount of money that drives this betting business is impressive. Pokerstars wants to cover everything! He is still a kid when it comes to sports betting, but little by little he will get his place.

Sometimes they offer great odds on obscure events but I get the feeling that this is going to change now that Sky's traders are in the buiding as well being able to filter out the sharps.
 Mober01/05/2018 14:15:58 GMT
They are expanding all the time.
Wonder how many more companies they are going to acquire in the near future.
First they had only poker games, now they are in, in all the sectors of online gambling.
It wouldnt be a surprise seeing them in the "land" industry also...

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