Good morning. Welcome to Catena Media's annual and Q4 report. I'm Michael Daly, the CEO, and I'm joined by Peter Messner, our group CFO. Today we're going to talk about our annual numbers, our Q4 highlights, our Q4 financials, our outlook, and then have a question-and-answer session. Reviewing our 2021 numbers, we had a great year at Catena Media. Our revenues grew 28% year-over-year. Our adjusted EBITDA was 32% growth year-over-year to EUR 68.8 million. Our North American revenues, which have become a significant part of the operations of the company, grew to EUR 67.9 million from EUR 31.5 million the year prior. Our new depositing customers also grew in the 32% range, and our operating cash flow also increased by 34%.
Again, a great year for Catena Media, driven heavily by North America, but contributed from globally around the world. We had a healthy progress in this quarter, along with a focus on long-term growth. Our revenues grew by 20%, with North America the main driver. This was a quarter where there were no new state launches. It was just year-on-year growth of the markets. Our organic growth was 9%, 19% excluding Germany, which as of Q4 this year accounted for only 3% of group revenue. Growth in North America was significant at 97% in both sports and casino, and now accounted for 51% of group revenues.
Revenue pressures on sports betting operators in Europe temporarily squeezed margins there, and we also did see some easing of COVID restrictions around the world, particularly in Japan, which impacted online casino sessions during the quarter. We did see continued growth in our adjusted EBITDA and we have a strong financial position. Our adjusted EBITDA grew 4% and our margin 40%, reflecting heavy investment in our future, North America, Central Technology, and our European casino products. There was also a EUR 1 million adjustment for the company's short-term incentive program, but that significant investment in personnel growth and technology is to maximize our long-term profitable growth. We will be investing every quarter towards this long-term market growth.
We will still see cyclical nature of our revenues from sports, but that growth and investment from us will continue with the intent that it helps offset over time that cyclical nature of the revenue streams, as well as prepares us to maximize in markets like North America, which have many years ahead of growth long after this land grab by various parties and operators slows down. Catena Media sees a strong and very healthy future in the long term, and we are going to continue to work to prepare towards those goals while maintaining healthy margins in the short term. Our acquisitions of Lineups and i15 Media are an example of this. They were added significantly during the quarter to the value of the company. The September launch in Arizona positively impacted cash flow in Q4 with a 52% growth in cash flow.
We are in a solid financial position for future growth, the investment, and flexible use in our capital. Very happy with the performance in the quarter, in a quarter where there was not a lot of, let's say, exciting activity around the world, but healthy growth from the internal organization and the work we continue to do across the world. With that, I'm gonna turn it over to Peter to go through the numbers.
Thank you, Michael, and very warm welcome to that fourth quarter earnings call from my end as well. Continued revenue growth. Total revenue in that quarter was at roughly EUR 32 million. It grew 20% compared to last year and declined by 4% versus the third quarter. That decline versus the third quarter comes entirely from market developments a bit outside of our control really, and that affected the sports segment only. What are those market developments? Firstly, October has seen an exceptionally low sports betting margin that has been affecting revenue on the operator side, and then our revenue share deals as a consequence. Secondly, we have seen certain COVID-related fixture postponements that impacted, in particular, the U.K., and the U.K. is one of our key sports markets in Europe.
On a stable share, which is 96% of total group revenue, is search revenue, and that grew by 29% as compared to last year, and likewise has been impacted by those market developments in the sports segment. Paid revenue was 44% below last year's level and on par with the third quarter, and overall reflects our approach, our managed approach really to selected paid revenue campaigns only. Paid media is a lower margin business, and our company has exchanged that with an increased focus on organic revenue growth since early 2020. The new depositing customers increased by 8% year-on-year during that quarter, and that's mainly driven by the sports segment. The decline in NDCs versus the third quarter is twofold.
Firstly, again, for sports, due to the reasons that I just mentioned before, and secondly, in casino, again, because of market developments in Europe and in Japan. I will get back on that in a few slides when talking through the casino segment performance. Taking a look at the share of revenue by segment and source, the share of sports normalized in the fourth quarter to 35% of total group revenue after a slightly higher 38% share during the third quarter, which was due to the sports betting launch in Arizona, but also the NFL start in North America. Else, from a sourcing perspective, the revenue from CPA, the cost per acquisition, has been stable now at 53% versus the previous quarter, and heavily increased versus the last year, where it was only 39%.
That is, of course, due to the increased North American share of the total business and all the state launches that we have seen during the past 12 months. North America accounted for 51% of total group revenue in the fourth quarter versus 31% last year. On the costs development, the total cost for the quarter, excluding items that are affecting comparability, was a bit above EUR 19 million, and that's an increase of 33% versus the last year and 12% versus the third quarter. It's mainly the result of our continued investments into the future growth. We have three main categories in the cost area.
The direct costs, those increased as a result of, in particular extended influencer partnerships that we have in North America on the Social Casino side, but also direct advertising in worldwide markets and the launch of, sports betting in Arizona was one good example of the recent launch there. The personnel expenses increased by 40% year-on-year and 13% versus the third quarter for two main reasons that Michael already touched upon. First, our aggressive investments in growing the North American market and during the fourth quarter in particular also in preparing for all the market launches that we have already seen now in the first quarter with New York and Louisiana, but also are going to see and expect Ontario and Canada, for example, is in the pipeline for the second quarter.
The company's total number of employees increased by 12%, while in North America, it grew by 69%. Personnel costs, as a general rule in North America, are much, much higher than group average. There is a cost transformation on the personnel expenses due to our increased business that we have in North America. That was the one reason. The other reason that is reflected or is also reflecting the continued investment in personnel is adjusted accruals that we had in the first quarter in relation to the company's short-term incentive program. What you can see on the table to the right with both quarter-over-quarter and year-on-year comparisons is that if adjusted for these personnel investments and accounting adjustments, then the other personnel expenses grew by 1% versus the third quarter or 8% versus the last year.
Finally, other operating expenses, that's the third cost category, those increased by 15%. They also included a growth investment into Central Technology and European casino products during the quarter. Again, if adjusted for those investments, what you can see on the table to the right, other expenses grew otherwise by 2% versus the third quarter or 6% versus last year. Going into our reporting segments. Casino is continuously the biggest segment and represented 62% of total group revenue and 78% of total group's adjusted EBITDA. North America has seen yet another very strong performance in both Michigan and also Social Casino, as I mentioned before on the direct cost side contributed to that growth, which has been a little bit impacted by eased COVID restrictions in comparison to the fourth quarter the year before.
Revenue and the business in Japan, which is casino only for now, rose very strongly versus last year, despite the volatility that we have also seen in search engine rankings and again, as a result of eased COVID restrictions. For the first time, really, since the beginning of the pandemic, Japanese people were allowed to go out, and that has been reflected in the overall usage of online sources. In Europe, we have seen continued headwinds in Germany since the new regulation kicked in on July 1st last year. There are still no casino operator licenses granted as of today.
As a result of all of that, the new depositing customers, the NDCs, were slightly down 1%, but the revenue, as you see, has not been impacted in the same way, and that is due to the geographical mix of the NDCs which come at a higher value in North America and Japan, for instance. Sports segment, that represented 35% of total group revenue and 21% of the group's adjusted EBITDA. In North America, sports really had a fantastic growth quarter, which has been driven by the state launches during this year, and those were Michigan and Virginia in January, and then Arizona and in fact, also Connecticut, now in the autumn. Also the contribution of the acquisitions that we have done during last year with Lineups in the springtime and the i15 Media assets during September.
Outside of North America and our European core markets, sports had a fairly weak October month due to the exceptionally low sports betting margins with the operators. It continued a bit in the U.K. primarily with COVID-related fixture postponements. You likely have seen this in various operator Q4 reports recently as well. On the very positive side, Italy has seen an all-time high yearly revenue during the last year. Outside of Europe, we continue with growth investments in primarily Latin America and in South Africa, where we see very attractive growth opportunities in regulated markets. Financial trading, that's our smallest segment and represented only 3% of total group revenue. That revenue development was temporarily impacted by changes in our partner portfolio.
We see now starting into Q1 favorable financial market trading conditions again and also expect to return to previous levels of marketing. AskTraders is really our flagship brand there and showed very solid growth in traffic. That was also supported by the geo-diversification that we are doing primarily in Southeast Asia, with Malaysia being the most interesting market there. We also see interesting opportunities in selected African markets. As Michael mentioned, or Catena Media's business has historically always been a very strong cash-generating business. The operating cash flow increased by 52% to a little bit above EUR 80 million, which represented a cash conversion of 143%.
That was really impacted positively by the launch in Arizona and the start of the NFL in September from a cash collection perspective, then in the final quarter. What is noteworthy on the cash flow statement, on the cash flow from investing activities, those included the second payment of roughly EUR 4.4 million or $5 million in relation to the i15 Media asset acquisition from September. The cash flow from financing activities included an outflow of almost EUR 10 million in relation to our share buyback program that was initiated back in September. Since then, we have repurchased approximately 2.3 million shares for a total consideration of EUR 13.1 million in total. As a result, cash and cash equivalents were at EUR 27.7 million at the end of the quarter.
Finally, our strong balance sheet. As of the end of the year, the total assets were a bit above EUR 366 million, and total equity EUR 228.5 million, including our hybrid capital securities. Amounts committed on acquisition, essentially deferred purchase price payments, amount to EUR 25.3 million on the balance sheet. These are entirely for Lineups and i15 Media asset acquisitions done during last year. Out of that amount, EUR 20.9 million or $24.6 million are due during this year, 2022. The borrowings of EUR 86.1 million include our debt financing through the corporate bonds, a bank term loan, and our revolving credit facility. Out of that amount, EUR 8.3 million are due and will be repaid during 2022.
That relates to the bank term loan. Other liabilities of EUR 26.3 million are primarily trade payables, but since this quarter, also other payables are included there with an amount of EUR 10.7 million, and that is in connection with a long-term contract that we have where we have changed the accounting treatment following the IFRS 9 requirements. All in all, total net interest-bearing liabilities were at a little bit above EUR 58 million, and that represented a ratio of such liabilities to our 12-month adjusted EBITDA of 0.84, which is very much in the middle range of our long-term financial target, and that is to stay in a range between 0 and 1.75.
At the end of the year, 33.9 million warrants were outstanding, and these warrants can be exercised during one of the exercise windows that always follow a quarterly or a year-end report until and including the report for the second quarter in 2024. With that view from our strong balance sheet, I hand back to Michael.
Thank you, Peter. Let's talk about our outlook for the future of Catena Media in 2022. Our current trading update for January is quite positive. We've had a strong revenue growth in January of 29%, 36% excluding Germany, which was still a healthy market in H1 last year for the operators and ourselves. Revenue growth in North America grew 64% in January year-over-year, fueled by those successful launches in New York and Louisiana. Our investments continue to have returns. These short and long-term investments that we do are paying off, and we will continue to do so with these, which are high margin returns on this work by our teams. January 2020, as a comparable reminder, saw launches in Michigan and Virginia at the end of the month. It was a very healthy January 2021 that we were comparing against.
I'm very happy with the team's performance, the company's performance, and look forward to the year ahead with New York now to be likely one of our biggest sports markets, maybe until California or Texas come along. January is on track to meet our expectations for Q1 2022. Let's talk about the outlook of North America, which is the fastest growing market for us globally. The North American sports business and casino business grew 116% in 2021 and is now 51% of our company's group revenues. If you look at this, approximately 1/3 of North Americans are in addressable markets to online sports, whereas about 1/8 of them have online casino. The online casino is the bigger business in the long term. It is already a very healthy business for us, given its small size.
Sports will continue to grow. We expect to continue to very strong business there. Now, while it continues through the acquisition phase for the operators of the heavy spend of acquisition, but even as you see operators pull back, that is where you will see affiliates shine because we are one of the most efficient ways for operators to gain new clients, which does not go away even after they slow down on that acquisition phase. I expect long-term healthy growth in the sports business in North America and then casino to grow to an even greater value over time. The time is the question, of course, always when it comes to regulated markets. Timing upcoming, we've had New York and Louisiana launch now in this year in January. Illinois will end its land-based only registration and allow online registration as we end the quarter.
Ontario, as Peter mentioned, we are expecting with an early Q2 launch date as of now. It is both sports and casino and is the first province in Canada, another very large market in North America, to start activity with us. Ohio and Maryland are also out there as approved and heading towards launches potentially later this year or early next year. There are many other states continuing to debate and move forward legislation regarding online gaming, sport in particular, but also casino in discussions in various locations. We're in a lot of states now. There are many states still ahead, and in those states we are, these are still the early days of acquisition. You're going through the acquisition phase now where it's the, let's call it the low-hanging fruit.
There's lots more to be done, and that again is where affiliates shine. We expect many years of long and healthy growth given that we will continue to invest towards that future. Our outlook for the rest of the world is also extremely positive. We are doing investments in our brand architecture and tech capabilities to improve our positions for future growth and the regulations that are occurring, particularly in Europe, but throughout the world. Our APAC business, which today is essentially Japan, it has robust revenue growth expected despite the COVID-related effects of opening and closing of borders. We're also continuing to look at how to expand our APAC business into more locations, so looking forward to that.
Europe, part of that work we're doing, we are seeing efforts in Italy continue starting to show signs of payoff as brand transformation there has led to positive results in Italy and the work by the teams there. We continue to our investment in European casino brands and will throughout this year to grow them, and there are still factors outside our control. The German and Dutch markets have delayed operator approvals. We've not seen casino licenses issued in Germany as of now. Those impact the speed of growth of those markets, but not the expectations of the long-term growth of them. Latin America and Africa are nascent markets. We are investing in them.
They are reasonable investments at this point, given that the markets are small, but we expect them to grow to exceptional size and volume of players, NDCs, and opportunities over the coming years. Key takeaways for this quarter are we had a strong Q4 performance with North America as the main driver, and that's on a year-on-year comparable where there were no launches this year and last year we had states launching in Q4. We are accelerating our growth of investments. We are coming out of this, let's say, post-COVID world where we need to be investing globally for this long-term growth of Catena Media, regardless of market conditions. That is particularly in North America, where we expect to maximize during the current phase of development there and its expansion and continue to maximize as those markets settle into long-term markets for us.
We saw successful openings in New York in January as well as Louisiana. New York, like I said, will probably be our largest sports market going forward. There's still a few more states that could trump that in a number of years, but for now, we expect New York will be the top dog. We're gonna see continuous strong cash generation, which creates financial flexibility, many options in what we do there, and allows us the scope to continue to invest in growth, both organically as well as M&A where it makes sense. We see significant growth potential in North America. We expect revenues to exceed, not hit, but exceed $100 million in 2022. That's provided current market estimates and launch timetables, such as we talked before about locations like Ontario launching in Q2. I'm very excited about North America.
I'm very excited about the whole Catena Media prospects for the coming years. We are in a race now in North America, but it is going to be a long-term campaign for us, which we expect to see great returns for this organization over the long term. We continue to maintain our financial targets of double-digit organic growth on an annual basis with North America as the core growth driver. We will operate a net interest-bearing debt-adjusted EBITDA interval of 0-1.75, which we are well within, giving us great financial flexibility. With that, I will open it up to questions from the audience. I'll turn it over to Peter to start this.
Thank you, Michael. There are a bunch of questions coming in before I will hand over to the operator for those in the line. Let me maybe just start with the cash flow during this year or during last year and also the apparent question of any buybacks. On the cash flow side, as you likely have seen, during last year, we have used a lot of the cash that has been generated from operating activities in our investing activities. We did two major acquisitions with Lineups and i15 Media, and in addition, quite a significant portion with share buybacks. What you can expect is we still have a mandate until the next AGM, which is on May 23rd this year.
We will announce when we start buyback or resume the buyback again with a press release, so you will get that information logically. Out of the other operating cash flow that is gonna be generated during this year, as I pointed out on the cash slide earlier, there are certain commitments when it comes to the previously done acquisitions, and there are certain commitments on the financing side as well, and then there's apparently still room for share buybacks. That should give enough input on that. There are a bunch of other questions that I think we can then come back later on. I will hand over now to the operators for those that are waiting in line.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, if you wish to ask a question, please press zero one on your telephone keypad. Please ask maximum two questions at a time and then get back in line. Our first question comes from Oscar Rönnkvist, ABG. Please go ahead.
Thank you, and good morning, Michael and Peter. Just a few questions from me. Starting off, regarding the start of Q1 2022, how much of the 29% growth in January can we extrapolate to the full quarter? Just looking at the yeah, some postponed games, for example, are the January numbers boosted by the postponed games from Q4 that are played in January?
The postponed games of the prior quarter? I'm sorry, I'm not understanding the question.
Yeah, exactly. You said that the postponed games in Q4 was impacting the revenues negatively. If they are played in Q1, can we say that Q1 is somewhat boosted by more games are being played in Q1?
Yes. Q1 starts, if we're talking about games, if I understand the question right, Q1 is the playoffs, which is the NFL games. Q1 is boosted by that in the start of January. Remember, the NFL season ends in the beginning of February, and so with the culmination in the Super Bowl. I don't know where you had the reference to postponed games in Q4. Yeah, Q1, it starts at-
I-
Sorry.
Yeah. I just recall that Peter said there was some fixtures that was postponed in Q4 in the U.K. primarily.
Yes, sorry. Yeah. There was slight boosting, but I would say that was really not a significant impact to the January gains. Growth there. January was primarily driven by the North American launch of New York, Louisiana, along with it being the playoff season for the entire online sports betting North American realm, as well as the overflow we see of that in other markets where NFL is followed.
All right, understood. Just a follow-up there. If we can talk about the timing a little bit. Could you discuss like-for-like growth in the start of Q1 as opposed to last year if we just look at New York launch and Louisiana launch versus Michigan and the Virginia launch? Do you think that you will have growth if it were to launch like the same date?
I believe so. It would have been closer to comparables probably, because New York launched earlier than Michigan. New York also launched with fewer operators. New York is a bigger state, but fewer operators launched day one than Michigan. Michigan had one of the best launches in terms of North America so far, and the number of operators, 10 or more, that launched at the same time in January 2021. They launched with sport and casino, and yes, sport has an initial influx, but then casino is a start and then grow from there.
What I expect, the differences then impact are going forward, you know, you may see slightly different curves in how those develop given that New York had more of January in it and Michigan had more of February in it during that initial launch cycle. Yes, I still think we would have seen year-on-year. I don't know that I have those numbers in front of me. New York had a very healthy launch with the operators appearing who did, and then additional coming in in the weeks after. For Catena Media, the more operators, the better the business, often up to a certain number, of course. Yes, comparables would still be, I think, positive.
All right. Got it. Just a final one. Can you say anything about the development in Germany? Like, are you seeing sequential growth from now on or can we still see very tough comps?
Yes. I'll speak to Germany. Germany, we will see sequential growth from our starting point now. Again, it is a very small portion of our total revenues of our company at this point given the North American growth, but also given the shrinkage of the German market. We will grow. It will be slow and staggered a bit in the sense that until some of those licenses, as I just spoke, the more operators, the more competitive a marketplace, the better a market it is for an affiliate. It is still in early phases there. Its comparables for last year will still be difficult for some for this H1 at least, because H1 last year was still an unregulated market, and there were still lots of unregulated revenues in Germany for us and operators. The comparables are difficult.
We are growing in Germany. It is slow. As more licenses develop, that will increase. The timing is very unclear to us. This is a newly regulated market, and it is not going to be like a New York launch or maybe as some of us might have hoped, where it was all day one and all these licenses get issued. It's a much slower approach. Markets that we've seen in slower approaches before, not saying it's the same, but markets like Pennsylvania, which started with one operator and then grew to two, that first year in Pennsylvania was slow but steady growth. Now Pennsylvania is a very significant market for us in North America. Germany has quite the same potential to us. It's just starting where it is, and we'll move forward.
All right. Understood. Yeah, I'll get back in line.
Thank you. Our next question comes from Mikael Laséen , Carnegie. Sir, please go ahead.
Yeah. Good morning. Thank you. Couple of questions. First of all, if you could talk about and explain the revenue guidance for 2022 and the $100 million, how you arrive at that? That implies about 30% growth year-over-year, approximately. Now you started with 64%, and New York is a big state, and you expect Ontario to be online sort of in April, I guess. What does it mean for the other states? Are you sort of expecting a slowdown in the growth momentum, or sort of is this the correct observation, or is the guidance on the conservative side?
I would say the guidance is on the conservative side to start with. We like to deliver on our expectations and exceed those if possible. There are many conditions in North America that make for uncertainty as we've seen over a number of years now. You know, we saw where the State of Pennsylvania, which I was just referencing, delayed itself by up to 18 months from the initial date that they were looking at for a launch. Things like that could still happen with Ontario and other markets. There are an election cycle going into North America this year, midterms. Could that have any impact on any of the gaming legislation? Uncertain. Could that impact an Ohio launch later in the year, etc? We are conservative on that.
We do expect to exceed that. We do expect the range of growth that you're speaking to will be the bottom of that. Remember also the start of January, though, is we are in a cyclical nature of the sports betting season. The NFL is still the predominant sport in North America when it comes to affiliation in particular. That season runs from September through the beginning of February. There are other sports and other things that we do work on, but the North American NFL cycle is the largest share of the affiliate cycle. What we see in January is not reflective of February and March, even from the launch dates.
Speaking of launch dates, year- on- year, we are now in what, well, we've previously termed as the hangover effect or whatever you wish to refer to it as of the new launches of last year, 2021. Michigan, which I spoke to, was a significant launch last January. Virginia, Connecticut, others, Arizona are now into their second year. In the second year, what we have seen is there is a slowdown compared to the first year because the first year you have pent-up demand from all those years they didn't have online sports betting. We have to overcome that as well. And how much of an effect that is depends on when those states launched in the sports calendar as well as the size of those states. We will exceed $100 million.
By how much and in what order of operations with states, that is the part that remains a little uncertain, so we remain conservative on that guidance. I think a 30% conservative growth rate is still a healthy expectation.
Okay. Yeah, that's helpful. Another thing that I was wondering about is the sort of underlying online casino market outlook in North America. If you can talk about that, what you see?
What I see is significant opportunity, and that is where we continue to invest for that long-term gain of owning the keyword positioning, having writers and content, and being prominent in the search engines for online casino terms across the North American continent. The casino affiliation is worth more on a per person basis and as a whole than the sports business. Our couple of states we are operating in casino in North America, doing an exceptionally healthy business for us and, you know, the addition of Michigan last year bolstered that even more. We continue to see yearly growth in those states. For the most part, we've seen more competition of course as well as others recognize the value of online casino in North America.
We see that we're only at about 12% of the addressable population having access to online casino. That's access to online casino. We haven't even tapped those markets yet for the number of players available in those markets. They have many, many years ahead of growth. Plus, we have so many more states and provinces to come along in North America. Again, that is just North America's online casino. You've then got Central and Latin America, which will come along at some point, and other parts of Asia. There is exceptional road ahead for Catena Media in online casino.
Okay, good. Thanks. Just a final one. On the operating cost side, is this level that you reached now in Q4 a level that you feel comfortable in or that we should expect growth from quarter-on-quarter during 2022? Just to be clear what you're indicating here.
For me, and I'll then let Peter speak, is our investment rate will relatively maintain over the coming year, I expect. What cycles there are in the revenue. The impact of that cost investment level will oscillate based on the revenues because we don't have as much control over the revenues. Again, part of these investments are to grow us in, as we spoke, the online casino, etc, so that we can more normalize the curve of that revenue so that we can be more consistent in margins, etc, over time.
I don't see a slowing of those investments in the near term because that would be shortsighted of us, especially given the opportunities in places like North America. I think it's going to be a managed investment, 'cause that is what we do. We are, as we spoke before, on our revenue expectations, we're conservative. We're also conservative there when we do our budgeting and planning. Now, Peter?
Yeah. Just to add on that, what you of course understand is that the entire company is in a transformation with the increased share of the North American business of the entire company. Just to remind ourselves, two years ago, 2019, the North American business was 18% or 19% of the entire business. It was a great European footprint or international footprint with an upcoming North American business. The year after, it was roughly 1/3 , and now it is already half of that business. That logically comes with a cost transformation overall as well because, as I stated, we are investing heavily into personnel and technology and the products in North America as well to be prepared for all these markets that are coming. That naturally has to follow with the revenue outlook that we have.
Because if we are growing 116% in 2021 versus the previous year and have a significant double-digit growth this year, we will of course continue. In particular, the personal expenses come at a higher rate as compared to the group average and outside. I would not expect significant cost increases on those personal expenses in the European business because we don't have these kind of developments and high growth rates or even expectations there because we are in more mature markets. There, the investments are more on the product and the technology side continuously to find these efficiencies that we of course will have. That is exactly that question of the operating leverage in the entire business. There's this underlying transformation to an even more focused North American business when it comes to the cost base.
Thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen, as a reminder, if you wish to ask a question, please press the one on your telephone keypad. Ladies and gentlemen, as a final reminder, if you wish to ask a question, please press the one on your telephone keypad. Thank you for holding.
Yeah. While we wait maybe for some questions, we have some online questions. Michael already talked a lot about the development in the U.S. over certain markets, also the online casino outlook. It's very hard to predict obviously what states that have not yet regulated online casino are going to regulate and in what timeframe. That is the huge opportunity that we have. Coming back to Germany maybe. We still have tough comparables in the first and the second quarter in comparison to last year because the regulation just kicked in on July 1st, and that had certain consequences. We do expect going back into growth mode in Germany as well. It is now running on a very low level, as Michael mentioned.
Germany has had a share of total group revenue of 3% during the fourth quarter. That is not that significant anymore. In that sense, you can see only upside potential there really. How fast that is gonna happen, that is very hard for us to predict. I would personally say that the regulation efforts in Germany have been disastrous from the way how that has been managed by the relevant authorities. We're still waiting for casino licenses to be granted, and that took a very long period of time.
There have been a lot of technical and licensing challenges, I think, by the relevant authorities and the operators as a consequence as well. We will have to see that. We are very positive when it comes to that. Germany is still an important and interesting market given its size. At least historically, it has been the biggest sports betting market in Europe. Do we have anybody on the phone line for questions?
We have no further audio questions at this time. Back to you, dear speakers.
I think, Peter, what I see is a number of questions around Germany, which you've discussed, cash flows, which we've touched upon, in North America, which again is we see a great growth there. We continue to explore how to maximize our investment in North America, both from Catena Media's teams, as well as M&A, as well as in investigating how to grow our investment base in North America. We continue those investigations. We'll continue those through the year. Some of those take longer than others, so we are continuing on that path to put more focus on the North American business as a whole. I'm very excited by the year ahead. I think the year ahead is exciting for Europe as well.
We were asked, you know, what does Europe look like for 2022? The European teams have been working exceptionally hard during the transformation in 2021. As we noted in Italy, we're starting to see some early indications of that work. That work continues. European regulations have been shifting, the Netherlands, Germany. We are growing, albeit very slowly in Germany, starting from essentially nothing again, but growing back for us and expected to grow faster as those regulations and licenses fall into place. The U.K. business has been healthy for us as regulations have stabilized there. Europe is now a more regulated world than it was for Catena Media and all operators a number of years ago. We know how to work and operate in a regulated market.
Yes, it means changes and transitions coming across to those, which we've done in a number of those markets now. There are potentially more ahead, but we are also learning from our lessons and preparing for those in new ways. I'm excited by Europe. It's not—let's be honest, it's not as exciting a story as North America in the near term. In the long term, the global affiliation picture is the exciting industry as a whole, and we will see the balance in our sports calendars, etc., as we continue this global expansion and reach to a healthy balance in our operating segments. I don't see, Peter, any additional questions in the text that need addressing unless you do.
No, I would recommend all of you, where we have not necessarily answered the questions, you can send those to our investor relations email address at ir@catenamedia.com, and we will get back to you on that.
With that, I wanna thank everyone for their time today, for their interest in Catena Media, and I wanna thank particularly all of our teams around the world for their hard work in Q4 and the start of Q1 2022. We'll talk to you all again soon. Thank you.
Thank you.