Hello, and welcome to the FDJ Q3 2024 revenue call. My name is George, I'll be your coordinator for today's event. For the duration of the call, you'll likely be in listen-only mode. However, you'll have the opportunity to ask questions towards the end of the presentation, and this can be done by pressing star one on your telephone keypad to register your question at any time. If at any point you require assistance, please press star zero and you will be connected to an operator. Please note, this conference is being recorded. I'd like to hand the call over to your host today, Mr. Pascal Chaffard, Executive Vice President in charge of Finance, Performance, and Strategy, to begin today's conference. Please go ahead, sir.
Hello. Good evening, everyone, and good morning for, some of you, probably. And with me today is, the IR team, namely, Hélène Chabbane and Marc Willaume. You will have seen the press release we published, at the closing of the market, and the presentation we are about to commence is online on the investor pages of our corporate website. So, as usual, this presentation of our revenue and news, at the end of September will be brief, to allow a maximum time for questions. So if we move to the second slide. At the end of September, our revenue stood at EUR 2,097 million, up 12% and 6% at constant perimeter.
As a reminder, in 2023, ZEturf was consolidated from September 29th and PLI from the third of November. The gaming revenue in France rose by 8% to EUR 1,907 million with lottery revenue up 7% and even 9% excluding Amigo, and continued strong momentum in sports betting and online gaming open to competition, with a revenue up 13%. The revenue at the point of sale increased by 9% and by almost 3% in France. The online revenue rose sharply by 39%, reflecting also the acquisition of PLI and ZEturf, and by nearly 25% if we take it at constant perimeter. The online activities now account for more than 15% of revenue, compared to 12% at the end of September 2023.
On this basis, and given our expectations for the Q4, we are adjusting upwards our guidance for 2024, and we now expect the revenue to grow by nearly 9% versus around 8%, and by more than 5% for games in France versus around 5%. The recurring EBITDA margin is expected to be around 25% versus around 24.5%. You will no doubt have read our communication of October the third, announcing the success of the takeover bid for Kindred. I will give you some more details in a few moments on this topic. You are also familiar with FDJ's business model, in which the financial and the extra financial performance are inextricably linked.
In this respect, we are very proud of the confirmation of our very good rating by Moody's System Analytics , and I recommend that on the next slide. The 71 out of 100 rating awarded by Moody's System Analytics once again ranks us first in the hotel, leisure, and service sector, which is made up of 39 companies and includes gambling players. The company ranked second at the score of 50 out of 100, which gives you an idea of our absolute leadership, 71 for us and 60 for the second. The group also ranked 31st out of more than 4,500 companies worldwide, tracked by Moody's. It's again a very good result.
FDJ ESG score confirmed the relevance of the company's CSR policy and also its good extra financial performance. So if we move to the next slide, I will give you some details of the revenue by activity, both to the end of September and also for Q3 as it's Q3 only. I'll be commenting in detail on the lottery and sports betting, and online gaming open to competition on the following slide. The other activities, which I will not come back in details, international and payment and services, posted revenue of EUR 190 million, compared to EUR 108 million to end September 2023, which is an increase, notably attributable to the integration of PLI, which resulted in a good performance, driven notably by EuroDreams and Instant Games.
Now if we do on the next slide, a zoom on the lottery. The revenue in France rose by 8% to EUR 1,907 million. The lottery revenue rose by 6.6% to EUR 1,650 million. This growth was driven by instant games and draw games, the two. Revenue from instant games was up 7.8% boosted by the success of innovation in the games portfolio, including the launch of Ticket d'Or , a EUR 5 game in early January, and the launch of digital game Maxi BlackJack in May. But really, all the launches have been successful this year. The revenue from draw games was up 4.7%, and 9.9% excluding Amigo.
This performance was driven in particular by EuroDreams and by more attractive EuroMillions jackpots than in 2023. If we may say 2024 is a normal year, and if you remember, 2023 was with a very low number of high jackpots. If I give you some figures, 35 compared to 19 at the end of September 2023. Amigo, since we lapped the relaunch in last June, has returned to growth since this date, since the beginning of June. Online activity remains on the lottery very dynamic, with a growth of 23.9%, taking the lottery's online penetration to 14% compared to 12% at end September 2020.
If we now talk about sports betting, in the sports betting and online gaming open to competition, the revenue came to EUR 407 million, up 13.3% and up 5% at constant perimeter. After the Euros, sports betting also benefited from the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, which, although a smaller event on the scale of sports betting, nonetheless boosted the offering with twice the figures of a Rugby World Cup. The operator's margin was, as expected, lower than it was in the first half of the year, which has benefited from exceptionally favorable sports results for the operator, obviously, and we have commented that quite precisely during our H1 communication.
The online activity continues on sports betting and online gaming to enjoy sustained growth, up 28.4% at constant perimeter. This performance reflects the intrinsic dynamism of ParionsSport Online, and also benefiting from the attractiveness of poker with a high level of cross-selling. The beautiful story is continuing. So now, if we move on the next slide. In global, the online revenue rose sharply, as I said in introduction, by 39.3%, including the acquisition of PLI and ZEturf, and by almost 25% at constant perimeter. This performance continues to be largely attributable to the increase in the number of players, which is good on a sustainability level.
This growth was driven both by sports betting and online gaming open to competition, and by the online lottery, which benefited from EuroDreams, very high rate of digitalization, as well as the attractiveness of instant games and the exclusive online offer, on which we have made very good progress. As a result, the share of online revenue has risen to 15.2% compared to 12.2% at end September 2023. The point of sale revenue increased by 8.6%, mainly due to integration of PLI. If we look only at the situation in France, the point of sale revenue was up by almost 3%. So let's look now on the next slide at our adjusted objectives for the full year.
We had announced 2024 targets, including revenue growth of around 8%, as I said in introduction, and around 5% in France, with a recurring EBITDA margin of around 24.5%. And given the level of activity at the end of September and also our expectations for the fourth quarter, we are adjusting this target upwards, and we now expect a revenue growth of nearly 9%, with growth in France exceeding 5% and a recurring EBITDA margin of around 25%. So in Q4, we expect almost a stable overlay revenue, something like 1%, and for two main reasons. The first reason is a perimeter one. We will lap in Q4, the consolidation last year of ZEturf since end of Q3 and PLI since beginning of November. And the second reason is activity.
First, we will lap, beginning of November, the launch in 2023 of EuroDreams. Second, we had an exceptional EUR 200 million jackpot in December 2023. That had a great success last year, and we don't have that kind of event this year. And third, regarding sports betting margin, that was exceptionally high last year in Q4. We had commented a lot and very much details at that time, this event, and we cannot count on the fact that we would have such a high sports betting margin in the Q4 this year.
As a result, in the Q4, we can expect quite low growth in the lottery revenue and decrease in revenue of sports betting and online gaming open to competition, due to the elements, only due to the elements that I've commented just before. So now we can move to the next topic, the success of the FDJ standard offer for Kindred. FDJ holds now 91.77% of Kindred.
Since October 11th, we consolidate Kindred from that date, and in the very near future, end of 2024 or beginning of 2025 , we will own 100% following the extension of the offer period to the 18th of October, and finally, the squeeze out that we'll, that we will be initiating, and that will take place, between the end of the year and the, very beginning of next year.
With regards to the commitments that we made when announcing the acquisition in last January, we can tell you that Kindred's Board of Directors that we have changed, we have taken the control of this board decided on October 14th to cease rapidly by the end of the year operating its activities in markets that are not regulated locally or that are not in the process of being regulated this regulated i.e. exit of the dotcom market with Norway at the top of list. As a reminder, we will keep Finland as there is a clear path to regulation in Finland. On the next slide we present you how the two group combine. We have already presented the figures for the full year 2023.
We'll remind it to you, and we have presented the figures also during our H1. For Kindred, these figures that we are presenting are only considering activities in markets that are locally regulated or in process of being regulated. It means in the perimeter that we will keep, and the FDJ Group estimates that it would have recorded, as a reminder, as I said, we have already communicated on that, in 2024 , if the acquisition of Kindred had occurred on January first, 2023, sorry, combined revenue of around EUR 3.5 billion and a combined recurring EBITDA of around EUR 840 million for the full year 2023, i.e., a margin of around 24%.
In 2024 , the Kindred being acquired on January 1st 2024 , the combined revenue would have been EUR 1.9 billion, and combined recurring EBITDA of around EUR 490 million for the first half of 2024 , giving a margin of around 26%. Now, the combined revenue would have been EUR 2.8 billion at the end of September 2024 . Kindred had this morning released its Q3 revenue and also confirmed its guidance for the full year.
So if we move to the last slide regarding Kindred, we have tried to figure out, because we thought this question would have been on your lips, including Kindred from October 11, and based only on the activities that retained by FDJ, the FDJ group reported revenue growth for 2024 would be around + 16%, compared with the 9% revenue growth for FDJ on a standalone basis, as I said earlier, and with a recurring EBITDA margin of around 25%, identical to that of FDJ. So maybe just to end this presentation, some words on how we will finance the acquisition.
So to finance the acquisition of Kindred shares of almost EUR 2.5 billion, FDJ are the recourses to EUR 2 billion bridge loan, which has drawn down on October 7 th. The group wishes to refinance this loan on attractive terms, notably through a bond issue, with the aim of achieving an investment grade rating. And just to give you some flavor of our cash position, at the end of September, the group also had available cash of more than EUR 900 million and a net cash surplus of more than EUR 630 million. So thank you for your attention. And now, with Marc and Hélène, we are ready to answer your questions.
Thank you very much, sir. Ladies and gentlemen, as a reminder, if you wish to ask any questions, please press star one on your telephone keypad and just make sure that your line is not muted to allow us to reach equipment. Our very first question today is coming from Jaafar Mestari coming from BNP Paribas. Please go ahead, your line is open.
Hi, good evening. I have a handful, if that's okay. So, maybe just two very quick, sort of factual ones. On the bridge financing, can you share with us what's the rate you're paying on this? What's the interest cost? And then should we assume it improves when you refinance with the bond issue? And then also fairly factual, you mentioned a number of elements that explain stable like-for-like revenue. I think you expect for Q4. I just wanted to confirm that. If you could recap those elements again, I'm sorry, I haven't picked up on all of them, especially in sports betting. I s Amigo lapping its regulatory impact, not something that will actually be meaningful in actual rating in Q4?
Yeah. Thank you, Jaafar, for those questions. So, on the bridge financing, I don't know if I will share the exact amount, but I can say that yeah, this the spread is something like 0.5, 0.6 point. I t's a better condition than the one we can aim when refinancing, but as you know, those bridge loans we will have a progressive interest rate. So for the first month, it will be better than the refinancing, and then over time, it will be less interesting. What is important to have in mind is that, in the short term, the interest rate is lower than the one that we will probably get from the refinancing. Slightly below the 5% that we've mentioned to you once we come on this acquisition in January this year.
Yes, less, yes, slightly below. Second, the point was to recap the factors that lead us to tell you that the Q4 will be not totally flat, but with a low growth. So what I said is that we have a quite important perimeter effect. As we have communicated over the year, with figures including the activity of ZEbet on one side and the PLI on the other side. As we have integrated ZEbet end of September, we will get on the Q4 the intrinsic growth of ZEbet, but not anymore the perimeter effects.
And this will be the same for PLI, that we had integrated very beginning of November, so it's a pure perimeter effect, this first one. The second type of effect is linked to the cyclicity of the activity in the year. And last year, we have this beautiful EuroDreams launch that has taken place end of October, very beginning of November. And we had quite a huge success on this on this game on the two months in 2023 . So we cannot we cannot expect to have a to have another effect linked to that because we have we will have a comparison basis, taking into account EuroDreams since the end of of October.
The second element linked to activity that I mentioned is a very important jackpot of EUR 12 million that we organized last year. It has rolled over. It has increased first to 2020 an d then to 2040 with quite a huge success last year in December. We will have maybe some high jackpots in EuroMillions, but normal high jackpots just not the one that we are creating. We cannot expect to have this massive effect that we had last year.
And the third element was linked to a very low price payout and very high margin on the sports betting, not only for FDJ, but for all the operators in France and maybe in Europe. If you recall last year on Q4, November, especially November and a part of December, we had a really very high margin. And we commented that on our annual results, saying that it had boosted our EBITDA margin for the year 2023, and also boosted our growth at the end of the year. And maybe we'll have another experience of a high margin, but we don't know.
What we do, when we do our forecast is we take the average margin that we have for sports betting, and it's always like that. For example, in Q2, we have the very high margin on sports betting, and it and as we communicated on H1, it has a little bit been rebalanced in Q3. Now we are at a quite interesting but normal level of margin, and we'll see at the end of the year, but we cannot count on a very high margin in Q4. And regarding Amigo, we had suffered on H1 of the basis of comparison, 2023, with Amigo before relaunch and 2024 after relaunch.
We said at this moment that if we look at the situation, intrinsic situation of the new Amigo, it was fine at a level that is lower than the previous Amigo, but fine and growing. Now you have the proof of that, because in Q3, Amigo is growing at a rate of something like 7%, with a pace, a growth that is linked also to the number of points of sale in which the product is sold. Now Amigo is not anymore having a negative impact on our activity, but having more positive impact as it is growing again. Is this okay for you, Jaafar?
Yeah. Thank you. That's super helpful, and this suggests stable or small growth in total revenue i ncluding those deals annualizing. But if I try to do a quick like-for-like calculation if your guidance instead e xactly four or five.
Yeah, if we do the like for like, I can help you. On like for like, it is 6% at the end of Q3, and when you do the calculation of all what I said, it's something like 4% at the end of the year.
Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Super clear. Thank you very much. If I can move on to the slightly more subjective ones. On the European Commission investigation, no new developments that we can see, but there's an interesting footnote in the Kindred press release, where you state that you would expect any potential financial penalty to be between EUR 0 and EUR 363 million. I just want to clarify whether you're saying, as a fact, that you understand that the EC has accepted the principle of the continuity of rights, and they're working on the fair license costs within that range, as used by the French state in 2019? Or are you simply saying, more as an opinion, that any outcome outside of that range, you would deem unacceptable, and you would appeal or attack or remedy?
Yeah. It's a little bit of the two. It's clearly the second part, it clearly. You clearly understand what we mean. Outside of this range, it is unacceptable, and we will challenge this decision. And the first part is that, in our opinion, what is probable, because we think that the decision of the Council of State in France is quite a heavy one, an important one, and will have an impact on the decision of the European Commission, but it's more, in our opinion, we think more probable, if we do probabilities, that the decision, whatever it is, will be within this range.
And also, what I said publicly, Stéphane Pallez can also say it again. We think that there is quite a good probability that we get a decision before the new commission is in place. I know that we have said that since several months now, and obviously we don't have yet a decision, but what we know is that the French state is working to go this way, and that it is also the will of the European Commission to have solved this case before the new teams will begin to work. It may come in the next weeks globally, because what we have understood is that the new teams are taking their job something like in November.
Thank you. And very last one for me. On the French budget law, in its current state, you would be subject, if it's voted, to the temporary corporate tax surcharge, but then there's nothing specific, nothing else on gambling duties. Now, the newspaper that published the rumor initially has now sort of backpedaled. They say, "Yeah, it's not in the project, but it will be introduced in parliament." What's your understanding of the situation? Should we read that the coalition government itself may increase gambling taxes as a bargaining chip at some point, or should we read it that, you know, of course, some minority MP in the opposition maybe can bring it up in parliament?
Yeah. What is true, and you have perfectly or well understood it, it is not in the project of the government, clearly. As we said one or two weeks ago, and it is the case, it's not in the best interest of the government. We cannot prevent any deputies to propose amendments, but in our knowledge, it is not in the project of the government. And globally, what we can say about that, it is that this measure, if it would have existed, would have been totally counterproductive to be clear, and we have also explained that.
First, on the levies, as this kind of measure would have had an impact on the GGR and eventually on the levies, so it doesn't work. And secondly, on the objective of the gaming regulation in France, which is to fight against illegal gambling and to protect the players. So it really is not a project of the government, and it doesn't work, because when you implement this kind of measure, you don't have the additional levies that you want to have, but you have not the levies, but you have the problems instead. So really, we will see, but we will not prevent any deputy to try to push an amendment. But again, it's not in the interest, we think, of the government to go forward with this kind of measures.
Thank you very much.
Thank you very much for your question, sir. We'll now move to Andrew Tam of Redburn. Please go ahead.
Hi, good evening. Quickly ask a question about Page 11 of the presentation, where you've got the updated full year guidance, and then the combined with Kindred. On my math, that kind of implies incremental EUR 184 million of revenues, probably EUR 46 million at the EBITDA line. If I annualize that, that's probably about EUR 730 odd million in revenues incrementally, versus the EUR 900 million that you spoke about in January. And obviously, the EUR 184 million on an annualized basis looks a little soft versus the EUR 200 million. The margin, EBITDA margin, looks a little higher at 25%. Can you just talk through the moving parts there, please?
Sorry, I didn't get your last sentence, talking about the EBITDA margin. So you say- I mean, you're saying that.
Yeah, in January, you said the EBITDA margin was about 23%-24%, so now you're saying it's 25%. So just trying to understand, curious what has changed since January.
Globally, nothing has changed in January. It's much more fine-tuning of the figure. You know, let's assume that now we have a, can I say, broader and cleaner access to the data from Kindred. So we are really in a position to really finely tune what is the contribution from the country or from the market we're gonna exit. And we have now much, I would say much more precise. So it's good news that, in fact, yeah, at the end of the day, the EBITDA margin we can expect is slightly higher than the one we initially expected at the early, at the start of the year.
Yeah. Okay, thank you.
For you? The answer.
That's fine. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Tam. Ladies and gentlemen, as a reminder, if you have any questions or follow-up questions, please do press star one at this time. We'll now move to Sabrina Blanc of Bernstein. Please go ahead.
Yes, good evening, Sabrina Blanc speaking from Bernstein. I have two questions from my part. The first one is regarding the potential impact of increase of corporate taxes in France. As far as I understand, that concerns companies which have more than EUR 1 billion of revenues, which is your case. And secondly, regarding the sports betting in Q3, could we have more color on the impact of the Olympics? I think that you said that it's twice the usual impact of rugby. But just to understand how the player payout ratio has normalized in Q3, in parallel.
Okay. Thank you, Sabrina. On the corporate tax, the budget bill refers to, yes, an increase from 25% - 30% for the companies, which revenue is between EUR 1 billion- EUR 3 billion. With Kindred, we will have, as a group, more than EUR 3 billion, but it has to be looked at, the activity in France as it is, as it is for the French corporate tax. So we are in the range from EUR 1 billion-EUR 3 billion. And this would be, will be for the fiscal year 2024, so impacting our net results of 2024.
If you do the math, looking at the level of corporate tax that we paid in 2023, as it is a little bit too early to talk about the 2024 full year net results. So, if we take this into account, which it was EUR 140 million, something like that, million corporate tax, so the impact should be something a little bit below EUR 30 million. And the next year would be a lower impact if we believe what is in the project of law today, because the next year it's not 30% but 28%. So I didn't do the precise calculation, but it should be over something like EUR 20 million. And that's it. What says the predictive low today is an exceptional contribution for two years. We will see, but today it's what is mentioned in the predictive low.
If I may, Pascal, excuse me.
Yeah.
If I may comment on the corporate tax, that is only for the activities, coming from the French market, so that should not impact the tax rate that you will have on Kindred.
No, it will not, because it's not tax integrated. It will have an impact on all the companies that are tax integrated in France, and Kindred will not be tax integrated in France, as it is not a French company. So we will clearly be between EUR 1 billion and EUR 3 billion. And maybe one thing I didn't mention, this is the beauty of the tax rate-weighting regime. It will have a positive impact on our financial results, as the interest rate that we will pay for the refinancing of our debt will get the positive impact of this tax rate. They will be in France . So tax deductible. It's a low consolation, but still it is.
It's more consolation. Okay, that's good. T hen the sports betting part, sorry.
Yeah, on the sports betting part, on Q3, what we have mentioned first on the margin during our call end of July is that it has rebalanced already, because the end of the Euro has been more in favor of the players and with a lower margin. Globally, at the end of the Q4, we are quite in a normal high margin. More normal high than normal low, but globally in the good average. And talking about the Olympics, yes, we were positively surprised because we have been over our objective on that. We thought it would be better than a Rugby World Cup.
This is the element of comparison that we took in our previous call. We said slightly over a Rugby World Cup, and we are twice this amount. Globally, it means something like 100 million stakes on this event, which is quite interesting. It is still not very high when we compare it to more than 4 billion stakes in the total of the year. So it stays a small thing, but less small than we could imagine, as this Olympics in global had a very huge success, as you know, in France.
What is interesting is that it took place at a moment where the level of activity on sports betting is quite low because it's the different European championships have not begun again. So it's quite interesting to have it at this moment. Does it answer your question, Sabrina?
Yes, may I add one question, please, regarding the Olympics and globally on the sports betting? You said that you are quite happy on the numbers of players on online, but does it mean that part of the online players came from the Olympics are new players on the sports betting part?
On the sports betting part, difficult to know when we look at the retail because it's too- we have not made a price precise surveys on the retail regarding that. On the online part, I don't think that we add a huge number of new players at this moment. Some new players, but I don't think it has been a huge success for recruiting new players. It's different than the Euro, clearly. But it has had an activity on players that were already there and with additional possibility to play during those Olympics.
But globally, if we look at it holistically, the Olympics has an impact. We look at the impact not only business sports betting but also the impact on the image of the company, as we are among the 10 companies that have been the most seen as a part of the Olympics, and we think it has had a good positive impact of the image of the company of FDJ. So globally, we are in the process to do the complete debrief of this event.
But, for us, it has not been only a sports betting event, but more globally, an occasion to show the FDJ brand, to show our team of athletes that had very good results, and to show the positive impact of our act- of our company on the society. It's more, more, more about that than only about sports betting results.
Okay. Thank you very much.
Thank you very much, Sabrina. We'll now go to Ed Young of Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.
Good evening. Three on the Netherlands, if it's okay. First of all, what do you think the impact of the tax changes in the Netherlands can be, and what's your attitude and ability towards potential mitigation of tax increase like that? Second of all, affordability limits came in at the start of October. You talked about them in the past and said, you know, the detail is the really key thing. Now, you can see the detail in the first couple of weeks of impact. Do you have any preliminary view on how impactful they might be on the business? And then third of all, there are sort of continued discussions politically around advertising and slots products and those kind of things. Just at a very high level, I was wondering if you had any further comments on the potential direction of regulation there. Thank you.
Yeah, we're getting the regulation in Netherlands like all the country. What we know for sure is that any kind of harsher regulation or increase in public levies, at the end of the day, translate to one or two very negative points for the state and for the state budget, as we consider that it may increase the overall share of illegal gaming.
From an operator point of view, what we think is that at the end of the day, it just favors a market concentration, which means that the market leader will just increase their market leadership, which means that in the very short term, they will recover from their market share gain, and they will from some mitigation measure that they will take compensate for the negative impact that could exist on their profitability due to the fact that some duty or some public levies will be increased. That is clearly what we can say at this stage.
Okay, so you couldn't quantify any of those impacts?
Yeah, it's a little bit too early to do that. And it's the same for the affordability checks. It's a little bit too early. We are, we don't have enough track record, to have a really smart and interesting idea of the impact. I think it's important also to remind you what we've said, when we were talking about the Kindred acquisition, that in all the market, the way we've looked at the market in order to build, our estimates and at the end of the day, our valuation of the business, we have taken a very crucial stance on market growth, on Kindred market share gains, and Kindred's, EBITDA margin, improvement.
So clearly, we do not consider that our view, on the role of Kindred profitability or growth or whatever, will say, dramatically change, taking into account those measure. And just maybe to comment on the increase in public levies, it's still in discussion in parliament. You've seen that some people are asking for, to be, I would say, done in two steps.
You may also have seen that the casino in the Netherlands, which are state-owned, have clearly said that if this kind of measure or even harsher measure are being put in place, they will go bankrupt. So you have a lot of people who are clearly, as we said, thinking that it might not be a good idea. So we'll see at the end of the day where the level is being set. But once again, we, we've shared with you what is our clear-cut position on this one.
Kindred is a market leader, so you may consider that there's certainly some, at the very first day, some negative impact, but clearly at the end of the day, market share again, I mean, I think everybody agree that, once again, this kind of measure will translate into market share again. And of course, if being needed, there will be some mitigation measure taken.
Okay, thank you.
Thank you very much, Mr. Young. Ladies and gentlemen, once again, if you have any questions or follow-up questions, do press star one at this time. Our next question will be coming from Matthew Stieglitz of LWC. Please go ahead.
Hi, good evening. I just only had one question. If you guys could talk a little bit more about, you know, your thoughts on operational plans for Kindred, potential synergies with Kindred, just what you're thinking now that you're closer to the asset and seeing more information. Thank you.
Yeah. Okay, again, it's a little bit too early to communicate on a very precise plan, but what we can comment on is that on synergy, we will have a synergy in the corporate functions, but it's not that material globally. A lso, in the French, on the French market, because on the French market, we will merge the activities coming from FDJ, ParionsSport Online, ZEbet, and Unibet France.
This is for sure, and it will be done in a timing that will have to respect also the fact that we first have to end the merger between ParionsSport Online and ZEturf. Then, in parallel, let Unibet in France take the new KSP platform of Kindred, and after those two steps, we'll merge the all. And we know the latest date to do that, this latest date is end of Q1 2026, because it's at this moment that we will not be able to operate anymore the brand ParionsSport Online.
This is one element of the decision of the antitrust, so we will focus on the brand, Unibet. So we will have those synergies in this timeframe. What I can say globally in the operating model is that what we want to do with Kindred is to have the more efficient platform of the market to, and to be able, and scalable platform to be able to do further growth.
What it means is that, with the rollout of the KSP and all the work that we will do within Kindred to globally improve the platform, we think that we will be in capacity to have the best industrial tool of the market to face the different changes in regulation and to be able to grow in different markets. So this is the global aim that we have. And in the coming months, we will and we have already begun since the last days build the precise plan, precise transforming plan that will make it possible.
What is a good thing is that all the good elements are already there, and we have just to monitor and to be sure that they will be delivered in the short, medium term, as we want to be able. We will come back, not now, but a little bit later, to the precise strategy that we have with Kindred. We will come back to that at the moment of our full year results. I take this opportunity to say that the full year results will be a little bit later than the previous years, as it will be on Thursday 6 th March 2025, this year.
We will release at this time guidance, full guidance for 2025. We will comment on our roadmap on Kindred at that moment. It's not totally set, but what we want to do is end of H1 Capital Market Day, sorry, to have the opportunity to explain in much more detail our medium long-term strategy and also the strategy regarding online betting and gaming, which is the business unit made of Kindred and the French activities in this area.
Makes sense. Thank you, very much.
Thank you very much, Matthew. We'll now go to Jaafar Mestari of BNP Paribas, coming back with a follow-up question. Please go ahead.
Hi. Just a follow-up, if that's okay. On the instant games growth, 7.8%, very strong. It's even stronger than what you had in H1. And you mentioned two high-ticket items, as new games that have driven that, both EUR 5, Ticket d'Or , Maxi BlackJack . What's the state of your regulators' views on EUR 5 games? Because a couple of years ago, they had pushed back on you launching a new one. It almost sounded like they wanted you to go, you know, one in, one out, if you want to introduce more of those above EUR 5 tickets. Are you able to do more of those, as many as you please now?
Clearly, no. We have a number of restrictions regarding our offer that those restrictions are already in place, so we have to play with those restrictions. We have a maximum number of total games of scratch card games on the EUR 5 games, on the more than EUR 3 games, et cetera, et cetera, on the EUR 10-EUR 15 games. So, yes, it's quite a stringent and complex regulation, but what we try to do is to find our path regarding all that. We have also to have better launches, to have better products.
And we are. We have been able, within those elements of limits and that are given by the regulator, to find our way. This is why I said that we were quite pleased of this result. And clearly it will not be. It will not change in the future. We will. It's quite normal. We have a number of limits, and our job is to not play with the limits, but to take into account those limits and to work with that as an element of framework. And we are quite doing a good job this year with all those kind of limits. But what is true is that sometimes, some, when you look at all the different limits, some of them begins to be not very totally consistent. This is an element of discussion with the ANJ.
Thank you.
Thank you once, sir. We now have another follow-up question from Andrew Tam of Redburn. Please go ahead.
Hi, thanks for taking the question. Just another one on a different topic. The other week, there was an announcement out of the U.S. that the price of the Mega Millions ticket would be more than doubling from $2 - $5, but also prizes would potentially increase. Is there any revenue upside potential for FDJ of potentially tweaking the game design, raising ticket prices from a revenue upside, earnings upside perspective?
Yeah, it's a very interesting one. We have to be very careful with the ticket price increase because if it's not done properly, what it leads to is a lack of winners. If you don't think that there is a total elasticity and it means that the number of bet slips that will be bought by the customers will be lower. So what you have in return is a low range of the number of winners. And we have faced that in our past. And at the moment when I was, it was my fault, I was a project leader for the Euro.
And when we come from French franc to Euro, we had this question of not letting the tickets having a crazy price at, for example, EUR 0.75, which was crazy. So we did it at EUR 1, EUR 2, EUR 3, EUR 5, et cetera. And we had this problem of not total elasticity and an impression of lack of winners. So it's possible sometimes to move the games. We did it on the lotto, for example. Some years ago, one grid was at EUR 0.3, and we have changed it to EUR 1.2 and then now to EUR 2.
It's possible to do it, but we have to be very careful. We have done it also within EuroMillions. What is more relevant in the short term to do that is to add some options around the games. Because another way to make the players play a little bit more is to convince them to take two grids instead of one grid, or to take the options A, the option B, the option C that we can add around the game. And it makes it more relevant because you add some more winners, because you have more chance to win on two, three, four games.
It's maybe more like that, that we will have an impact on the sales, reducing the risk of having a backlash on the players, saying, "This EuroMillions game has never. We never win." I don't know if it has been very clear, but for me, it's not the right way to think, thinking only raising the price to increase the sales.
Okay, thank you.
Okay, it's good for me to answer your question. Thank you, sir.
Ladies and gentlemen, as a final reminder, if you have any questions or follow-up questions, please press star one. Thank you. Okay, we do not appear to have any further questions at this time. Mr. Chaffard, I'd like to call back over to you for any additional or closing remarks. Thank you.
Thank you. I wanted to thank you all for your attention and your questions. I will close this call. Our next financial communication will be the full year 2023. As I said before, it will be exceptionally on the beginning of March, in the context of the consolidation of Kindred, having been acquired at the end of the year. Maybe for some of you that are also debt investors, we will see when we will refinance, and we'll be happy to talk to you again in this, in that context.
Thank you, sir. Good luck.
Thank you, sir.
Thank you all.
Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes today's conference. Thank you for your attendance and we wish you a good day and goodbye.