Ladbrokes , Britain's second-biggest bookmaker, reported an increase in third-quarter underlying operating profit as a sharp rise in winnings from gambling machines offset a decline in bets placed over the counter at its shops.
The company, which on Monday pulled out of talks to buy online rival Sportingbet , made an operating profit of $78.4 million in the quarter to end September, up 8.5 percent after stripping out the boost from the soccer World Cup to last year's numbers.
Ladbrokes, which has nearly 2,100 betting shops in the UK, said on Thursday net revenue was up 2.5% in the period, including a 2% rise in UK retail revenue.
Gross win from gambling machines grew by more than 20 percent while over-the-counter net revenue was down 8.3%.
The company said it had benefited from offering new games on its machines and was confident of achieving further double-digit growth from machines in the remainder of the year.
The breakdown of discussions with Sportingbet followed Ladbrokes abandoning plans to buy 888 earlier in the year following months of protracted talks.
It had already committed to a 50 million pounds investment programme over two years and will launch a new online sports betting product in the first quarter of next year. Glynn said he expected the full benefit of that strategy to come through towards the end of 2012.
The company has already expanded its in-play betting offering, increasing the amount of football in-play events from 200 a week in August to 500 in October, it expects that to increase to 700 a week from November.
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