France’s Pari Mutuel Urbain (PMU) recorded a 0.2% rise to €1.87bn in gross gaming revenues for the nine month period to the end of September and strong progress in its international activities, although its land-based business in France continued to drop owing to a difficult domestic economic environment.
The group’s online betting and gaming business continued to rise, revenues for online poker, horse racing pari mutuel and fixed odds sports betting were up 4.3% at €1.26bn on the same period in 2012.
PMU said its overall igaming market share of 44% and associated gross gaming revenues (GGRs) represented 83.6% of the market, making it the leader in the French market in terms of scale.
Stakes for online betting were up 15,8% to €138,9m and GGRs were also up, 14,3% to €26,2m, representing 25,6% in market share making PMU number 2 in that segment behind Betclic.
Stakes for poker rose 10% to €415.2m for the period, GGRs rising 22% to €15.7m for that particular vertical, with PMU now number 3 after Winamax and PokerStars in the French online poker scene.
Total gross win for PMU’s igaming activities, including online pari mutuel, were up 2,6% to €207m.
Group stakes dropped 0.6% to €7.7bn compared with the same period in 2012, with land-based horse racing stakes dropping 1.4% to €7.1bn and gross gaming revenues for the vertical remaining largely stable (-0.1%) at €1.83bn.
Its international tie ups provided PMU with €449,5m in revenues, a 102% rise on last year, the group added that stakes placed on French football’s Ligue 1 were up 38% for the new season compared with the start of the 2012-2013 season.
Technical and product innovations kept being launched as the group implements its ‘PMU 2020’ strategy, the aim being to simplify and educate the broader French public to betting regardless of the platform: online, mobile or in land-based outlets.
