Welcome, everybody, to the presentation of Batson 2017 Third Quarter Results. I'm Pontus Linval, I'm CEO of Betson. And I also have with me on my right hand side, our new CFO, Karen Hilson and also PIA, PR and Communications Platform. So I'm going to take you through this presentation of our 3rd quarter results. So the highlights for this quarter is that the revenues increased by 11%, out of which 2% were organic.
We saw continued growth in the casino and quite a big increase of active customers. However, we are not really satisfied with the growth of the company or the revenues in full, and we have several actions in place to improve growth. We will now continue the rollout of our new mobile sportsbook, which is now in place in our biggest brands, but not yet in the biggest sportsbook brand, which is our partner, Rieland Dans, and I hope we will be able to launch it there in the near future. We will also continue during the year to put the OBG framework on apps and desktops. Apart from that, there are several actions being done to the organization and the way we operate, some of them not being reported in this report, in order to increase the efficiency in the company.
If we look at the financial summary for the Q3, revenues increased by 11%. We saw quite a strong growth in the region Western Europe and some strong growth in casino figures. Sports book gross turnover is growing in constant currency. But given the fact that we had quite strong headwind in currency for the sportsbook, the total revenue from sportsbook is down compared to the last year. Obviously, this is not something that we can really have an impact on as a company.
So the EBIT declined compared to the strong Q3 last year. We had some heavy currency effects on SEK 27,000,000, and we also had some negative impact of the recently acquired companies of SEK 5,000,000. We also pay betting duties, which we don't really look at as a negative impact. This is something which is in the company's strategy to increase the share of income from regulated markets, and this is something that will happen as markets regulate over time. But obviously, it has an impact on the EBIT when we pay more betting duties.
We also had some one offs due to changes in the organization of SEK7 1,000,000 for this quarter. The EBIT margin was 18.3%. So this is a slide that explains a little bit that tries to explain how the business is going when we take away the impact from acquisitions and currency. If we start in the column of Q3 2017 reported on top and then go leftwards, you see that the impact from acquisitions on the revenue line was €91,000,000 If you take that away, then you end up at €1,088,000,000 And then you see the currency effect, another €32,000,000 And we end up on the left hand side, which is the figure looking when you take away currency and acquired business. And then it would have been revenue growth of 5.4%, which is a little bit more than reported, but still not a very still not a figure which we are satisfied with.
Same goes for operating income, which also had a huge impact on mainly currency but also from acquisitions made. So obviously, the company has a lot of actions in the pipeline to start to work on these figures and hopefully make them better in the future. There's a turnaround of Netplay, which is behind plans. When we acquired Netplay, we said that this company is a long term acquisition. We should look at it on a 3 year basis to get some good effect out of that.
But still, we're behind of that quite we're behind the plan that we had already. So we shouldn't change the position in 2019. But for the time being, we are behind, and this we try to work on now. We have done a rebranding of the Spanish brand that we bought through our own brand, Starke Sino. And we have launched race packs and that's safe in Lithuania, and they are performing as expected.
So this slide is to show you a little bit what happened to our revenue mix, and we compare in the Q3 for 2015, 'sixteen and 'seventeen. And again, let's start on the right hand side and look at 2017, which we report now. As you see below this chart, we are licensed in 11 markets, and we paid that in due to this quarter of DKK 52,000,000. That's a substantial amount of money. We also have a continued drop in the Turkish currency, which has a big impact on the licensing revenues that we get from our corporation.
And if you move backwards to 2016, we had only 8 licenses and paid betting duties of €34,000,000 and the year before that, we had 5 licenses and we paid betting duties of €23,000,000 So this obviously explains the impact of the tax that we pay. But if the industry is going in that direction, we will pay tax in more jurisdictions, and we like that. It's a natural way for this industry to develop, but of course, it has an impact short sight on the EBIT, hopefully not long sight in the same way. So revenue by region. Nordic markets, still our biggest market, almost 50%.
And as I said, they didn't grow in the Nordic market, which is obviously not we're not happy with that. And we hope that we will be able to get back to some decent growth shortly in this region. Western Europe was driven by acquisitions, but we also had good growth organically in the casino. And then Sierre region, as I told you before, heavy currency headwinds took it down. But we have improved the product offering, and we have further improvements to do there.
And the underlying business is now stable and even it doesn't point downwards anymore. It's actually the other way around, but it points upwards, which I find very positive. So currency, we cannot do much about. Business, we can do things about, and we have already started and we can already see the effects. This picture shows what the difference between the revenues last year and this year and from left to right this time from last year.
Then in the Nordics, we have more or less no growth at all. It's almost the same. Then Western Europe, quite a strong growth mixed by acquisitions and organic growth. And then Sieta, negative growth, mainly based on currency headwind. And then other is a very small figure, but still some growth of 26%, and that gives us the revenue for the Q3 this year.
Our casino keeps on growing. As we have said before, there has been a good job done for our casinos for the past few years, and we have a very competitive offering. So we're happy to see that when we have that offering and we know how to run the product, then it grows strong. And it's the growth is driven by the new mobile BAB and the live casino is really strong as well. So it shows that when we put a lot of focus to the product and deliver good products, then we manage to deliver good growth as well.
We will continue to roll out the OPG front end framework on desktop and apps for 2018. So there's a lot of more to come in terms of product launches in the next year. Then to the sports book, which was a decline year on year, again, mainly currency, but also we cannot say that we're happy with the performance of the volume in the 4th book either. So and that's mainly depending on products. But we have done great product launches recently.
So as I say in the report, I think that our product that we have now, they have never been better. And still, we have a pipeline of new releases and things to deliver. So I'm very optimistic about that. The decline, obviously, in the Turkish lira had a huge impact on the turnover of the sportsbook, but not only in the lira, also in the Georgian currency was down as well. Sportsbook margin was at 7.1%, not much to say about that.
And we just had to work more on this product. This is our own product, the sportsbook, which I find a very strong competitive asset to have. It's in our hands what we do with this product, and we know what we want to do. So and we know that we can do it. So I'm really optimistic about the rollout of the new mobile web sportsbook, which will now continue.
We haven't launched that one. We haven't released that one to the our Turkish partner yet, which is a big part of our sportsbook operation, and that will happen soon. We will continue to improve the offering itself with more markets and things like that. And we will roll out this framework, LPG framework on desktop and apps during the next year. We have a lot of work to do, but we have recently, in the last 6 months, shown that we are able to do that and to release good products.
The activities of the business, the underlying activity is still good. As you can see here, active customers is quite healthy, and we had a great intake of active customers in the 3rd quarter. And we wish to continue that intake in the Q4 and next Q1 next year in order to build up for software centership 2018. Also, deposits are quite healthy, showing that there is an underlying activity in our business, which is still strong. Then some regulatory updates.
The reregulation of the Swedish gaming market is ongoing, and the new regulation is expected for 2019. So I guess already next year, 2018, we will start to see activity, and we will try to take part of that in the forefront as a Swedish company. We also see reregulation in the Netherlands coming, and it is now the miss has cleared a little bit recently. So we are now quite, I shouldn't say confident because I'm never confident about gaming regulations. But it looks like we will see new regulation in 2019 in modern, which is very good for us.
And we will keep on monitoring the development to ensure compliance with EU law as we always do for all the markets where we are active within the EU. So what's the focus going forward then? The quarter has started well. There are actions to be made in certain areas in our operations and also in our products. We will continue to strengthen the product offering, as I said, and we have a list of things that's going to happen within the next 12 months up to the World Cup.
And I also want to increase focus on efficient operations. So having said that, I open up for questions. Martin?
This is Martin Arne with DNB in Stockholm. My first question is on this product development that you are talking about. I mean I know you had a period behind you now with quite a lot of focus on product development, And we're not really seeing sort of that bearing much fruit, at least in the group numbers on revenues. So why should we sort of see things you're doing now as a driver going forward? And also what about the timing for when we could expect improvements coming out of these initiatives, what you're doing now?
I think we have previously, we have released the UPG framework on the casino. And I think when you look back on the figures since that release, you can see that we've been doing okay in that area. And then we have been talking about releasing the OPG for the sportsbook. And maybe what you referred to is that you don't really see the impact of that yet. And I can understand that, and I also understand why, which I'm glad that I do.
And that is that the major part of our sportsbook revenues comes through our partner Real, not a major part, not a big part. And that currency effect takes away all other positive effects from other markets. So it's very hard to struggle with a currency that has such a downgrade. Active numbers, underlying numbers are still strong. And I hope that if we manage to weak companies to stabilize.
But if the currency stabilizes, then we will see a different development. And also, I think we will be able to capitalize on this also in the Nordic markets when this season now comes up. Now is the start of the season to do sports betting in all markets.
And about the Nordics, it looks like you're fairly stable year over year. I know last year, Q3 was a strong quarter. But in the market, I don't know what's your view of the market growth in the Nordics this Q3. And just thinking about what's changed because you recently grew really, really strong in the Nordics. Yes.
Obviously, we're not satisfied with the growth in the Nordics for this quarter. And I can't say that I know exactly what has changed. I think casino figures are not that bad. Obviously, we haven't succeeded really in all parts. So there is work to be done there.
It's This is increasing competition. Part of this, a lot of new brands investing a lot ahead of the regulation. Is that a factor?
Obviously, the competition is very hard. I mean, the Nordic gaming market is flooded with companies. So competition is hard. I think we have some great assets that we will try to utilize that will differentiate us like our own sports book, which is a good product and which we can control, I think that will help us a lot in the future.
And also on the Netherlands, you seems to have different view now than you had a couple of months ago. And just curious to hear your views on your chances to be part of the new reregulation market and your chances to achieve a license in 2019 given that you have sort of gone head to
head with the KSR recently? Yes. Going head to head, we have taken actions in order to protect our rights to the business in the Netherlands, and that's what we have to do in many markets. I'm sure we will be one of the companies that will be having a license when that machine comes through because we're one of the biggest operator there. And we haven't done anything wrong really apart from stating our view to the Dutch government and authorities.
What has happened the past few weeks actually recently is that the NIST has cleared a little bit on the process. So if we compare the situation now compared to early this summer, we see a more clear route to regulation, and that makes us comfortable that this is going to happen. And we are a part of that route. We are in discussions with the KSA through our lobby organization. And my view is that the route to regulation looks a little bit more clear today than it did only months ago.
And final for me is Positive for us because I would say that the vision in Volan has not been very clear so far, but now it's a little bit more clear.
And finally, a question on Netplay development. You said it's a little bit behind your initial plans. Do you still expect sort of net break to be closer to your group margin end of next year? Or is this more into 2019?
I would say more into 2019. And this is something that we that's a part of our plan. We knew that we acquired this company with a certain in a certain situation, in certain contracts, etcetera, And we are lucky to have the financial strength to be able to own such a company for a while. It's a possibility in the future to develop it further. But apart from that, we are behind even our initial plan so far.
And that is, of course, not acceptable, and we will try to change that, and we are working on that as we speak.
And what has not really met your
expectation, including our own our expectation, including our own capability to run it. So now we have changed that, and we will try to bring it up to our planned level, which is not going to mean make or break in 2018, but still it will be better than it is today.
You say that you have a well invested product, and you should be able to grow. And you mentioned this in the report with a change of marketing strategy. Can you explain a little bit more about what will be better
and compared to how it has been? In terms of the products, we're obviously releasing this new sports book a bigger part of our operations, which should be better. In terms of marketing, we've done a reorganization, which I think will improve efficiency of us on how we do marketing. Yes, that's about it.
And in terms of timing, when do you adjust the organization to work this new way? Yes. And how long time will it take to adjust the organization to work this new way?
It's hard for me to estimate that. And it's not that our marketing has been a catastrophe in any way. So it's an ongoing process that I will see that will go on for at least a year, but that should come out with higher efficiency.
Okay. A question about the Zika region. When I do some back of the envelope, it seems like in constant currency, Turkish, the license revenue from the Turkish operation is actually declining. And it must be that Georgia is doing well. Can you give some has competition stayed continued to stay high in Turkey?
Or has it become more troublesome to operate there?
Yes. I think it has been no secret that the operations in Turkey for our partners have struggled for a long time. That is based on the operation itself but also on competition, as you say. What we have seen now recently is a change in that trend, and it has now stabilized. And it's actually, as I said, not pointing downwards anymore.
And that is good enough for me. Today, I'm happy about that, that we point in the right direction again because it hasn't been like that for quite some time.
And a final question for me here is Spain and the sportwood launch with that construction. If you compare it to your own spot book solution, how does the bed construction solution compare
to yours? I haven't done that comparison right now. For us, it's important. Time to market is important for us now. And the best construct platform, I'm sure it's a capable platform.
It is licensed already in Spain. So in order to save the time to market, we go on that but I can't really state that. But I can't really state that.
I have a question regarding the Netherlands. I would like to understand the development there of this metric. Can you explain what has changed the past few weeks? When you mentioned that the mix has cleared and gives you the better clarity there in terms of regulatory changes? And also, the court ruling under the development there, what decided what was sort of why do they decide not to appeal the decision at this point?
Can you explain the reasoning behind that?
Yes. The reasoning is that now there's a government in place in Holland, and we have got the information that there is the process to get legislation in place is up and running, then we don't have that process in black and white exactly what it looks like. But it's still a big difference from what it was like in June when there was no process taking us to regulation at all. So that is the change that we have seen regarding regulation. It used to be no process, which means maybe never regulation.
And then this regulation, which we find is not compliant with EU law, then that regulation would persist, which we don't accept, okay? Now there is a process and it's up and running, and then we can withdraw and we trust in that process that the politicians realize that it's advised to put regulation in place. And what was the second part of the question?
Your decision of 13.
It's, of course, in line with this. As long as we see a clear route to regulation, then there's no need to go to court.
So what is the next step now? Yes. So for you.
For us, it's just to wait and to be a part of the process, if we can. We will keep on discussing with KSA through our lobby organization and make sure that the process moves ahead towards regulation. So given the information we have today, it's just pretty much wait and see. If that changes, then we will change our way of acting, of course.
If there is, but we can get a fine for operating those Dutch related brands still?
I wouldn't say that there is no risk because it's very hard to analyze. But normally, when you have legislation which is not compliant with EU law, you can't make that effective towards gaming companies. You've seen that in other markets such as Hungary. So and this on this 3rd party Euridical advice, we have decided our route of actions going forward.
It's Marc Ganahl here. I have 2 more questions. Firstly, you mentioned that you have a strong performance in live casino, and that's helping the casino also now in the Nordics, I guess. But could you also comment on the slots machine markets and what you're seeing there?
Yes. Slot machine market is still strong. There's still a big interest, and it's like this kind of slot machines has been around for 100 years, more or less, in different shapes and forms. And I see no change to that in the future. There is a change.
However, in the marketplace, there are a lot of more suppliers today, new innovative companies. There are big companies, small companies, and we have the offer, which is more or less almost impossible to overview today. So that's one change that the product offering is really, really wide. And then of course, we see things going on in product development with different suppliers, looking at VR and things like that, which I think would be quite interesting in a few years' time.
What do you think you did organically in slots revenue in this quarter? If you exclude the Netplay acquisition, how did your How many problems?
How many problems? Yes. I think we performed okay. But I wouldn't say it's a success, but not bad either. Okay.
And final question on your cost and efficiency in the quarter. Is top line came in a little bit below what I expected? And then you had a couple of EO costs. So it looks like efficiency was pretty good. Can you comment a little bit more on what actions you took?
And what's your plans for the future when it comes to efficiency and costs?
The efficiency was quite good. And as you say, when you look through the P and L, you find different items there that have an impact on the EBIT. You also look at the depreciations compared to last year. It's different. And when you pile this up, we are still an effective company.
But we are an effective company, and we can be even more effective. And this is something that we will work on. Obviously, it's a big company. It's like a big cruise ship. You don't make these sensors from one day to another.
You make them, but it takes time before they come into force. And surely, we have started to look into efficiency and take measures. And I'm sure that we will see results from that, maybe not immediately, but in the midterm side.
Mathias, SEB. I have two questions. The first, if you could perhaps elaborate a bit more about the underlying factors that inhibited growth in the Nordic region this quarter? And then secondly, perhaps some comments on the cost of services provided. Since that figure actually was basically more or less flat quarter on quarter despite regulated revenues continuing to increase.
Have you done any changes in your use of affiliates and such?
Okay. On the Nordics, I don't have a very solid answer to that. I mean it's not that we have not succeeded. It's our biggest region. We have a big part of our revenues from there.
We didn't grow as much as we want to, but it's a matter of small percentages. There are measures to be done that I think we can change that part of our revenue stream in the future. On the second question, on the cost side, there's the fact that we still had quite a decent development on the casino side, and this is associated with higher cost because we pay revenue share to suppliers. When the sports book becomes a smaller part of our revenue, obviously, as we own the sportsbook ourselves, it doesn't impact that line at all. And we also mentioned that Lyle Casino has been going well.
That's a more expensive part due to its nature of operation than normal casino. And that's why the relation between these figures are a little bit different. Okay. Any more questions? Do you have any questions from somewhere from the outer space?
So a question from the web is, with Netplay, will you, over time, move away from using 3rd party products, back end and content solutions?
With Netplay as such, I can't answer that. In general, in that form, we have like the one platform strategy, which means that it's we want to go on one platform. But that's not like black and white. It's not we have to adopt certain markets and where platforms are licensed and things like that. So it's more of a long term ambition for us to consolidate operations on one platform.
Then, of course, go away from 3rd party products. We don't do that. We have a lot of 3rd party products. All our product suppliers are 3rd party, and we try to find a balance between 3rd party products and our own products. But of course, for us, it's important that we don't operate 20 platforms by ourselves, and that is a major strategy for us going forward.
I hope that answers the question.
And also second question is how
do you view
Swedish. In the new Swedish regulation or suggested regulation, there are demands regarding responsible gaming. Do you think that will have a negative impact on profitability?
No, because responsible gaming is good for the revenues over time all over, you need to operate in a responsible way. And long term, there is no other way to operate a gaming company other than in a responsible way. So that will not have a negative impact on revenues long term.
Thank you. Questions from the conference call?
Thank you.
Our
Our first question comes from the line of Sharish Afif from Danske Bank Markets. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Thank you so much. I do have a question regarding how we're going. You decided not to appeal. I guess you've explained in a couple of times already, Pampers, that the situation has the regulatory situation has changed. What is the reason for not going ahead with appeal?
It is that what I said, that now as long as we see a route towards regulation, then we don't need to fight in court. That will only take time and resources. But that is the situation how it is now, and we manage this situation on a day to day basis. So and this is what we have to do all the way until we have regulation and license.
All right. And then a follow-up on that. What is the likelihood, if you would have to put a possibility, on not actually obtaining a license when regulation kicks in?
Likelihood of us not obtaining a license, I think that it's not very likely that we would not. I mean, people who are active here in the Nordics, they know the sentiment here that we are in close cooperation with the authorities on creating the new law here. And you also may remember that we were not very popular when we opened the shop at the Atgarth on, and that doesn't affect us now. We made nothing illegal even though it was a little bit annoying. Things like that happens.
We're a gaming company that comes into monopolistic markets, and we mess with systems that have been around for 100 years, and that creates some friction. And this is not something that really enables authorities to keep us out from licensing procedures.
I see. And then I'll ask last question from me on the same situation. I guess you guys are running the 2 brands business as usual right now until our regulation kicks in, in the Netherlands?
Yes. That's our ambition, to do that, yes.
Okay. Thank you. No further questions for me. Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Pani Wengzon from Boudenhorn.
Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Yes. Hi there. Thanks for taking my question. I'm just wondering, the last quarter when the old CEO there, he was thinking that marketing was going to go up a lot in Q2 and Q4 because of OPG and so on has come through. And if we adjust for his for the cost of his departure of SEK 7,000,000, SEK 8,000,000 in the quarter, it looks like the costs are down quarter over quarter instead of being up this €30,000,000 €40,000,000 he talked about before.
And it seems to be marketing and personnel costs that are down a lot quarter over quarter. Can you just explain what you think is the normal marketing that you're going to put behind the new product lines and hopefully drive the organic growth from that?
Yes. First, a little bit of a statement. The cost that you mentioned was not only for it was organizational cost, not only for the departure of the CEO. So that's a mixture of organizational costs that we took. Regarding marketing, it's not that we have like a percentage that we put to market in each quarter.
It's depending on what events this is coming, how our product is performing. So I can't really set a fixed figure on what we're going to do in the future. What we say in this report is that we will push a little bit more in the Q4, which I think is natural for us to do when we have some further enhancements on the product. And we want to build up a good foundation before the next year. And as you can see in our figures now for active clients, we have managed quite well-to-do that in the Q3.
So we wish to continue with that and push a little bit more in the Q4. But it's very hard for me to say some kind of figure to base the future on this is like not day to day, but quarter to quarter decisions that we make.
Okay. And so is it fair to assume that the EUR 30,000,000, EUR 40,000,000 extra costs that were going to go up in Q3, they will now come in Q4 instead?
I can't answer that question. It's not that we usually move money between quarters like that. I can only refer to what we say in the report, which is that we will push a little bit more in the 4th quarter. Okay.
Thank you.
Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Rasmus Enge from Handelsbanken. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Yes. Hi, good morning. I was also coming back to the very low cost in this quarter. Is it so that since Metatley is mainly the disappointment on top line, is it so that their cost base is very, very flexible that the costs go down when revenues go down a lot? Or is there something else going on here that
Net fair, I would say it's not such a big part of our revenue so that it has any big impact on the cost side either, no matter if it's like fixed cost or not. So that's not the case really.
But still, the staff costs are down now, especially if you're just for the organizational change costs. Is that what we should be expecting going forward that Q3 is sort of seasonally low costs from a staff perspective? Or is it just temporary that you had a few departures that you will replace? Or
Maybe Q3 is a little bit lower on cost side for staff, but main thing is that we have no decision to make any dramatic changes in terms of staff costs. We have an organization, and that organization is very capable. We want to keep that organization. We want to trim it further. But then we don't maybe I don't feel a big need to load on a lot of more fast in the near future.
We have a very capable organization. It's just a matter of gathering around our business and what we're going to do and make
that happen. And on that part, Anders, have you considered becoming permanent CEO again?
I have not considered that, and I got that question this morning. And my answer to that is that it's not on my top priority right now to look for a replacement for myself. So I'm doing other stuff right now. And the Board had said that they are happy to see me back as CEO. And I'm really into this.
I want to grab this opportunity to see what I can do here. So it's not that it's going to change in the near future as far as I know it is.
And one final question. When you set up marketing in the Q4, do you mean that as a percentage of revenues? Or do you mean that you set it up because revenues are bigger? I mean, would it weigh on the margin compared to this quarter?
I can't answer that. Obviously, it will probably be the higher absolute figure than this quarter. How it comes in, depending on revenues, that depends a lot on how revenues develop as well. So it is hard for me to answer that one.
And finally, what did you say about OPG for Real on the sports book? When are you going to launch that?
In the very, very, very, very, very near future.
All right. Fair enough.
Sharp enough answer.
Our next question comes from the line of Bille Dagh from Keyhole Capital AB.
Thank you. So I know that you have a lot of questions on hold on, but just to be perfectly clear here. So you sound very positive when it comes to the regulation and the process and then the timing of a licensing of the remote gambling markets. But have I misunderstood that the appeal that you proceeded with earlier in over September, that, that was relating to the enforcement rather than the regulatory process? And has the regulator changed their rhetoric regarding the enforcement up until the market opens up?
Yes. But first, to maybe be a little bit more clear on our view of the situation. I mean this kind of situation is never clear, unfortunately. I mean, it's not a transparent process. It's not very black and white, but it looks more clear to us now than it did before, and that's it.
But it's a big difference from saying that everything is clear. There's a very stable route onto licensing, and it will happen on this and that date. It's not like that, and it can change again. But it's the reason for doing that, what you asked about it, it's exactly what you said. That's why we didn't appeal.
Okay. So should we take it as that the regulator has sort of taken a step back regarding the enforcement? Or is that your view?
That is my view, but even that part is not very clear. But this is this is my view of it.
And when it comes to sort of communications with the regulator, do you do it directly, sort of 1 on 1 with the regulator? Or is that mainly driven through the NOPL organization?
Unfortunately, I don't do it myself, so I don't have full insight of that. But I know that it's both ourselves as a company and the lobby organization, but mainly the lobby organization. We have a local lobby organization who is very knowledgeable, and they handle that communication as the first instance. Then of course, this lobby organization is supported by us and other companies that has knowledgeable lawyers and legal advisers for that region.
Okay. And one last question. You mentioned in the report that if the situation turns to the worst that you would consider taking further actions and taking this to another level in the court system in the Netherlands. What kind of actions would prompt such a move? Is that a
I don't want to go into or I can't go in on details on that one because it's depending on what's happened. But I can comment in general that, I mean, we're a gaming company. We're not a fighting company. We don't live on fighting in courts, but we live on gaming, and we have to protect our right to do that in the regions where we operate. And that, we will have to protect.
And these decisions are made on a daily basis or ongoing based on the situations that we face. I can't say any more than that because we don't make any decisions today, which is firm for 10 years. We make decisions on a daily basis based on the situation that we face.
Our next question comes from the line of Christian Hellman from Nordea. Please go ahead. Your line
is open.
Hi, thanks. A question on the Realme business. You say that it's stable, but could you just clarify a bit by what you mean by that? Because revenues are down 10% adjusted for negative FX in the quarter.
Yes. What I mean by that is that by the end of the quarter, we have seen stabilization. We have seen an uptick on different KPIs that we used to look into the future. So we can see that a lot of things have happened, and this is what I mean by that.
Okay. So
yes, I guess, if you can't go into more detail, let's just have to take your word for that. Another question on the trading update. As far as I understand, the sportsbook results have been pretty good at the start of Q4. Can you sort of confirm that? Or what would you say the sports book margin have been so far in the quarter?
I don't know what the margin has been so far. Of course, we follow that on a daily basis, and there's been good days and bad days already in this quarter. I can't say if it's I wouldn't say that it's an exceptional nothing exceptional that has happened so far.
Okay. But is it do you know if it's above or below sort of the historical average?
I don't know that. I read the daily figures from day to day, and I but I don't have an average for this period that we think about in the presentation.
Okay. Another question on the tax rate, the corporate tax rate. It was 9.4% in the quarter. And I just looked back at the historical numbers for the last couple of years. I don't think it's ever been above 7%.
What's the reason for 9.4% in Q3?
I can't answer that straight away.
It stands out quite a bit.
Yes. I think we can investigate that. I don't have an answer for it right now.
Okay. And finally, just you had a plenty of questions from Holland. But just sort of right now, it's business as usual for you guys in Holland? Or has anything sort of changed in terms of how you use affiliates or
I'm not down to that kind of detail, but as far as I know, it's business as usual for us.
Okay. Yes, I think that was it for me.
Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Sherish Ashish from Danske Bank Markets. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Thank you so much. I do have a couple of follow-up questions. You guys don't provide a specific number on how much OpEx will grow sequentially. You guys have been doing that for the 2 last consecutive quarters. Is there a specific reason?
Is it going to be much higher than what it has been previously? Or
No. I mean, it's this report is formed in a way that I want to report, and it has the level of guidance that I find proper, and that's it. I don't want to go into more details on that. It has nothing to do with the planned expenses and things like that. This is how I think it works for the campaign.
Okay. And then a last question on Turkey. If we just adjust for whatever FX headwinds that may come in the remaining Q4, What about you said that you can see uptick in KPIs from the Turkish business. Will it do you guys expect it to actually have a higher contribution to sales in Q4 than what it's been in Q3 and Q2?
In absolute figures, I hope so, of course, because it should be a good quarter. But that's my personal hope. That's not guidance for anything, how it will turn out. In relative terms, I would really appreciate if that happens because that shows that that would show that the initiatives were done on the product has effects. And I hope it's still I sure hope it's still.
So we'll see how it turns out.
All right. So you don't have any specific comment on but you're much more confident on Turkey actually improving in Q4?
I think that, as I said, I see the KPIs on the business going in the right direction, and that should have an impact on the outcome if nothing else happens. So that's that's as much as I can say on that.
Okay. Thank you so much.
Thank you. As there are both further audio questions registered, I'll hand back to our speakers.
Yes. Okay. So we have Karen to comment on the tax maybe.
On the corporate tax question, it has sorry, I'll mute so you can see.
Yes, it has increased this quarter,
and that's because of Georgia. We have seen increased taxes in Georgia. So that's the impact we see.
That's a very clear answer. Okay. Do we have any more questions here in the room? If not, thanks for attending and see you in a quarter's time roughly. Thank you.