Flutter forecasts 30% earnings jump in 2024 as US takes off

DUBLIN, March 26 (Reuters) - Flutter, the world's largest online betting company, said on Tuesday it expects to increase its core profit by around 30% this year thanks to a four-fold rise at its fast-growing and market leading U.S. brand Fanduel.

Analysts at Jefferies said Flutter's forecast for 2024 was broadly as expected. Shares in Flutter, whose brands include Paddy Power, Betfair and Sportsbet in Britain and Australia, rose 1.8% in early trading.

"If you look at the midpoint of our guidance and compare it to our next biggest competitor, the gap actually appears to be rising in terms of the size of our revenues," Flutter CEO Peter Jackson told Reuters in an interview.

Flutter expects U.S. core profit of $635 million to $785 million versus last year's $167 million, which represented its first full year of profitability in the United States, where a ban on sports betting was lifted in 2018.

It expects core profit of $1.63 billion to $1.83 billion in its others markets. That compares to $1.71 billion in 2023, which Flutter said was in line with its guidance.

Flutter, which gave a fourth quarter revenue breakdown in January, said group revenue grew by 23% in the first 11 weeks of 2024, driven by a 56% increase in the U.S. through record engagement in February's Superbowl.

Fanduel, Flutter's biggest brand by revenue, has a 43% share of the U.S. online sports betting market versus Drafking's 36%, with BetMGM, the joint venture between MGM Resorts and Entain, a distant third place.

Jackson said the "very strong" growth so far in 2024 came despite the recent entry of new players, including sports merchandise group Fanatics and ESPN Bet, which casino-owner Penn Entertainment and Walt Disney launched with aggressive growth ambitions last November.

"We don't underestimate how hard it is to compete with us," Jackson said, citing Flutter's decision last year to shut its other, much smaller U.S. brand FOX Bet.

Flutter increased its share of the online U.S. gaming market to 26% last year and said on Tuesday that it became the market leader in that segment too in January.

Year-to-date revenue was up 3% in its international division and 17% in the UK and Ireland, where its market share rose to 30% last year. Revenue fell 8.8% in Australia, where Flutter expects further reduced profitability in 2024 as a result of trading and regulatory headwinds. (Reporting by Padraic Halpin; editing by Jason Neely, Kirsten Donovan and Alexander Smith)