365.L Regulatory News (365)

12 Jul 2006 07:00

ukbetting PLC12 July 2006 12 July 2006 ukbetting plc Trading update The Board of ukbetting plc (UKB), the online sports content and gaming company,announces that trading during the first half of 2006 has been strong and in linewith Board expectations, showing revenue rising 10% and a significant increasein profitability over the same period in 2005. The group's network of content sites continues to receive record levels oftraffic, attracting more than 9.1m average monthly users, an increase of 7% overH1 2005 and peaking at 9.75m during June. These users viewed an average of 430million page impressions a month, up 52% over last year, with a peak of over600m pages during the World Cup month of June. Advertising revenue for the period was up 34%, despite the decision not to takecompetitive gambling advertising, which was included in last year's figures. Theequivalent FMCG revenue was up 48% over H1 last year. This growth was helped byimprovements to the content sites including the delivery of new advertisingformats, which allowed video campaigns from companies such as Sony, Littlewoodsand Siemens. These innovations, including the introduction of TEAMtalk TV,resulted in more than 8.2m video clips being viewed in June 2006, up from100,000 in January. In addition, affiliate performance under the Oddscheckerbrand improved significantly. During the period there were 53,000 gaming registrations, up 20% over last year,with the content sites delivering 62% of Totalbet and ukbetting customers,giving an average cost of acquisition significantly below the rest of themarket. Following the changes to fixed odds trading at the end of January, underlyingfixed odds margin showed a 15% improvement. Casino and poker revenues were up33% against the corresponding period last year resulting in a gross win of13.2%, up 18% on last year. The Board anticipates that there should be furtherimprovements in its gaming operations following the introduction of a singlewallet for poker in July, followed by the integration of its casino operationsby Q4 2006. -ends- For more information, contact: ukbetting plc 020 7766 6909Peter Dubens, Vice Chairman Financial Dynamics 020 7831 3113Edward Bridges / Juliet Clarke / Hannah Sloane This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock Exchange