888 Holdings, the company that owns the online poker room Pacific Poker and the online casino 888.com, reported a $65 million profit for 2005, an increase of 59%. Most impressive was the rise in net gaming revenue for poker - up 179% from $39.3 million to $109.8 million.
Net gaming revenue was up 52% overall to $271 million. 888 Holdings diversification strategy seems to be paying off, as the highest growth rates were reported in the UK (103%) and other non-US countries (64%). The US share of net gaming revenue fell to 55%.
888 Holdings now has over 23 million customers from 177 countries of which 5.5 million are real money accounts. More than a quarter of it's customers play online poker, compared to almost 20% last year.
Net gaming revenues derived from it's casino increased 16%, but more impressive was the rise in net gaming revenue for poker - up 179% from $39.3 million to $109.8 million.
The company recently introduced a multi-lingual version of it's poker room, which is now available in German, Italian and Swedish in addition to English. French and Danish versions will be added soon.
888 Holdings also announced it has plans to add Blackjack to it's poker room and is working on the introduction of a shared purse system.
CEO John Anderson commented: "Our company is more diversified both in products and geographically and we are in prime position to benefit from the industry consolidation that is inevitable."
The company remains confident in the outlook for the coming year, and expects to continue it's growth both organically and by "selective acquisition". Anderson said earlier this year 888 Holdings is investigating the possibility of taking over a non-US sportsbook.
Despite the good results, shares of 888 Holdings were down yesterday due to the approval of Rep. James Leach's Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (H4411) by the House Financial Services Committee. The same trend downward was observed in other online gaming stocks.
The Leach bill still has a lot of obstacles to overcome though and similar attempts in the US to outlaw online gambling have failed consistently in the last five years.