Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Evolution Gaming Group Q1 report 2020. Today, I'm pleased to present CEO Martin Carlesund and CFO Jacob Kaplan. For the first part of this call, all participants will be in listen-only mode, and afterwards, there will be a question-and-answer session. Speakers, please begin.
Thank you, operator. Welcome everyone to the presentation of Evolution's interim report for the first quarter of 2020. My name is Martin Carlesund. I'm the CEO of Evolution Gaming. With me, I also have our CFO, Jacob Kaplan. I will start off the presentation with the quarterly highlights and achievements and give some comments on our new fantastic titles as we have released and the two that will go live in the second quarter. Jacob will then go through the financials, and I will conclude with providing some thoughts on the future, followed by a Q&A session. Next slide, please. We continue to work ever so hard, and I'm very satisfied to be able to present yet another strong quarter for Evolution.
The product we launched so far this year, including new titles in the game show category, in combination with continued strong market development and global demand, have contributed to a very high growth rate. Furthermore, we've also experienced strong results from the investment in increased studio capacity that we have made in the recent years. Those two factors, in combination with a constant pursuit of cost efficiency, has had a positive effect on our margin. While we, as a result of the coronavirus, have operational challenges, of course, demand for our products continues to be strong, and we have been favored by the lack of sports betting games. We now see many new players being introduced to the live segment. This means that we have very good start of the year as well as the second quarter. Naturally, still with continuing operational challenges as a result of the coronavirus.
For the second time, we reached revenue over EUR 100 million in a single quarter. The revenue growth in the quarter was 45%, amounting to EUR 150 million compared to EUR 79 million Q1 2019. EBITDA increase of 79% amounted to EUR 64 million compared to EUR 36 million Q1 2019. EBITDA margin of 55.7% compared to 45.3% same period last year, and an EBIT increase of 89% compared to the same period last year. I would like to sum this up as nothing but fantastic achievement by all of you working at Evolution. I'm simply very proud of everyone and the way they handled the current challenging situation.
I'm glad I can repeat myself from the Q4 presentation and again say that the profitability is the highest that we have ever reported in a single quarter. I also would like to note that during the first quarter, the board of directors decided to exercise its authorization from the annual general meeting 2019 to repurchase own shares such that its holding of own shares does not exceed 10% of the total number of shares in the company. Evolution has, in the first quarter, acquired a total of 338,000 own shares for EUR 9,854,000. All acquisitions were carried out on the NASDAQ Stockholm Stock Exchange. Next slide, please. The spread of COVID-19 has put the world in an exceptional and challenging situation.
The spread of the virus has meant operational trials for Evolution as well. Our main priorities are to minimize the risk of spreading the virus and to create a safe workplace for all our employees, as well as to maintain the operations for our operators. We follow all the requirements from the authorities in the countries we operate, but in many cases, we have taken more far-reaching own actions. Thanks to the extensive measures that have been implemented in terms of distancing, changed work processes, and routines for our employees, our operations have been able to continue without any large negative effect. However, in several of our studios, we operate with fewer tables compared to normal, and our studios in Georgia and Spain have been entirely closed for some time but is now operating again.
During these periods, a large share of the traffic has been managed by the company's other studios. To be a global company with several different sites has been an important factor in these times. With that being said, our studio in Riga is an important hub for which several of our most popular types are being run. Next slide, please. In this chart, you can see the activity in the network, and it has continued to increase. The fourth quarter normally has a strong seasonality, and it's satisfying to see an even stronger increase during the first quarter. Demand for our Live Casino games continues to grow in general, and our worldwide demand is increasing.
Partly as a result of several successful game launches, the number of bet spots from end users amounted to 8.7 billion compared to 5.1 same period last year, a 71% increase. Revenues from dedicated tables and environments also contributed to the increase as a result of additional customers launching and extending their customized Live Casino environments. Our customers gain market shares and advantage by using our products together with happy end users and we with the coming releases of nothing but fantastic and groundbreaking games, their competitive advantage will increase. We can clearly see the audience of live games increase not only to existing players in the online gaming sector, but also with completely new player groups attracted by our game shows. This is a clear success of our strategy to bring the Live Casino into [software players], which was initiated over three years ago.
Next slide, please. As the company grows, the staff increase, and the recruitment of staff is absolutely crucial to our success. Much of the greatness in Evolution is that we have managed to recruit the best talent in all our markets. Success of Evolution Gaming is all because of our hardworking, young, and talented people with the right winning mindset. At the end of the first quarter, there were more than 8,000 employees, and in this slide you can see that out of those 8,000, there were almost 6,000 full-time employees. As a result of the coronavirus, we will not see the same increase the coming quarter. However, we will continue to grow with our clients which will mean a high recruitment pace as soon as the situation with corona is more stable in the world again. Next slide, please.
This slide shows the breakdown of revenue by geographic region. The Nordics is a stable market and as I have said before, we have had a strong start in the first quarter of 2019. Our growth has been moderate to flat in the Nordics from Q2 2019 and onwards. Much has been said about the regulation in Sweden and its effects during the year. From our point of view, we think the regulator has done a good job and at least for live games, which we have a good understanding of, channelization is very high. U.K. shows a decrease in the year-over-year growth. U.K. is negatively affected by lower fixed fees as U.K. companies have moved their billing address to other countries in Europe.
However, revenues relating to player volumes are up compared to the same period last year. The rest of Europe continues to develop well and constitutes about 60% of revenues. Both Asia and North America is growing quickly with 160 and 54% respectively. We see good potential in both these markets and expect continued growth rate during 2020. We are especially happy to see the recent regulatory movement in U.S.A., which increases the potential and I will get back to that on coming slide. Other, including South America, Africa, and remaining part of the world show good growth of about 50%. Revenues from the regulated market shows a growth of nearly 20% and constitutes 38% of revenues.
As stated before, Evolution strategy is to be first, the first Live Casino provider in regulated markets, and we expect this number to grow as more countries regulating their gaming markets. Next slide, please. 2019 was the year of product innovation, again, if I may say, I can promise there will be no less of products and innovation during 2020. I know we will continue to innovate in the product area also this year. During ICE in London earlier this year, 12 new titles were announced, of which two went live during the first quarter, Speed Blackjack and Lightning Blackjack. Today I'm happy to announce that on the April 23rd, we are launching Mega Ball, a lottery-style bouncing ball game, including a first-person version, the RNG.
Mega Ball is our first game in the lottery vertical and expands Evolution's exciting range of game shows. It's aimed at the new audience that might not have found live games before. A way for operators to cross-sell and introduce live games to a wider audience. During its beta phase, the game has exhibited a high attraction, which makes the launch very exciting today. In addition, we will expand our first-person portfolio with three more launches in the second quarter. Another table game will also be launched during the second quarter, Power Blackjack, as well as Baccarat Multiplay, which makes it possible to place bets on all our Baccarat tables simultaneously without joining each table separately. All our Baccarat tables are displayed with a video and a small version of the betting grid in single-use interface. Very exciting.
It's important to point out that we continue to innovate substantially, enhance, and refine the playing experience in table games in our core. Our ambition is to pave the way for the entire industry by launching new groundbreaking products and of course continue to increase the distance to our competitors, we'll do if we continue the path of delivering value to our operators and fantastic player experience to our players. It's also very important to continue to push forward adverse so paranoid during those Corona times. Releasing Mega Ball is one example of that. We will all need to be prepared for the time when this will be over. We need to be fast out of our starting block to grasp opportunities which will be there. Next slide, please.
In addition to product development, we are continuing to invest for the future in form of new studios. We continue to stay focused on further strengthening our North American footprint. We have expanded the capacity in New Jersey to meet the growing demand to be able to serve more customers with more games. The construction of a new studio in Pennsylvania continues, but with postponed timetable due to the COVID-19. However, our aim is to launch it before end of this year. Michigan has accelerated its casino regulation process, and we hope that the state soon will be the third regulated market in U.S.
This is very positive. We expect more U.S. states to allow online gaming in the coming years, as well as the position. We are well-positioned to capitalize on the opportunities that will open. It's also important in this context that New Jersey has outperformed our expectations, which shows a good potential for the U.S. market. I will now hand over to Jacob, who will guide you through the financials. Next slide, please.
Thank you, Martin, and good morning to all of you listening. I'll take you through a closer look at our financial performance during the period. I'm on slide nine, titled the Financial Development. This slide shows our financial performance per quarter. As Martin mentioned, the year has started in a very strong way, continuing several of the positive trends that we saw all through 2019. Revenues in the first quarter totaled EUR 115 million and almost a 9% increase compared to the fourth quarter of last year. We've had good growth across the whole product portfolio. Our game show games and first-person RNG games are doing really well with very high growth rates, but also the core table games, Roulette, Blackjack, Baccarat, are growing very nicely as new players find their way into Live Casino.
Underlying growth was good all through the quarter, but with a boost towards the end of March as effects of the coronavirus development, such as closing land-based casinos and canceling of sporting events took place. This has been short-term positive for Live Casino during the end of the quarter. However, this effect was most visible at the very end. For the quarter as a whole, it's a limited effect. As we mentioned in the report, while still very early in the second quarter, it has started well with the tailwind of the effects I just described. EBITDA, the gray bars in the chart amount to EUR 64.1 million, also in the first quarter, equaling a margin of 55.7%. We have managed to increase margins steadily during the past six quarters.
We have proven that we have economies of scale in our business model, so as we grow revenue, we should be able to also increase margin. Part of the very positive margin development is also due to relatively high attention to cost in the organization. Cost awareness is an area where we're never satisfied and always look to improve, and trying to stay lean is sometimes difficult, but at the same time supporting growth. As we've experienced, it pays off well in the long run. Looking year-over-year, we did guide in the 2019 year-end report a couple of months ago that we expect higher margins for the full year 2020 compared to 2019. As Martin stated and also wrote in his CEO comments in the report, the strong start of the year supports that guidance.
Speaking of margins, I'll repeat the message that those of you who have followed us for some time will recognize, but the one that is important for us. Our first priority is revenue growth. Should we need to trade-off between margin expansion and top-line growth, we will opt for revenue. Examples could be entering a new market or launching a new product line, expanding the live market. We have a strong position in the market and believe long term our shareholders will benefit from increased size. In other words, we give margin guidance for the year, but see that's our best guess right now for the year. Our margin is a product of decisions that we make in running the business and not a goal in itself that we will sacrifice other things to achieve.
Let's go to the next slide, please. Taking a look at the more detailed P&L, starting from top to bottom, revenues for the quarter, again, the EUR 115 million. It's an increase of 45% compared to the same period 2019. We are pleased with the growth, also taking into consideration that Q1 2019 was a strong quarter with 54% growth compared to the first quarter of 2018. Strong comparable in this quarter. Moving down, personnel expenses total EUR 33.3 million in the quarter. It's up 15% compared to the same quarter last year. Personnel costs mainly driven, of course, by staff and increase in staff in our operations. We're also recruiting in other areas of the business as we continue to expand.
Year-on-year, we have increased staff in both operations and other areas, as you saw in the previous slide. The COVID-19 has limited our expansion recently and reduced the number of tables we operate. Those effects were at the end of the quarter, very slight impact in the Q1 numbers. Depreciation is EUR 7 million. In the quarter, it's 22% higher compared to the same period last year. Other expenses, continuing down, include, among other items, consumable equipment, communication costs, consultants, and royalties. The line amounts to EUR 17.7 million, up 24% from the same period last year. I mentioned royalties. It is tied to some of our games where we pay a royalty in relation to revenue.
The cost item royalty will increase as revenues grow, and it's the largest part of the increase year-over-year in the other revenues in the other expenses category in this quarter. Summing up, total operating expenses increased by EUR 7.6 million or 18% in the first quarter. Tax is at EUR 2.8 million. It's a tax rate of 5% in the quarter. And all this summed up to profit for the three-month period of EUR 54.2 million and an EPS and earnings per share of EUR 0.30 per share. For the rolling 12-month period, EUR 0.95 per share EPS. We move on to the next slide, please. Starting to the left in the slide, the chart shows development of capital expenditure.
As we mentioned earlier, the COVID-19 development has affected pace of new studio construction, but we're still doing whatever we can to advance projects and expect progress to pick up as soon as the situation allows. Our outlook for the year is that investments will be slightly higher in EUR terms compared to 2019. In relation to CapEx, in relation to revenue, CapEx will continue to decline. Staying on the charts to the left, the great part of the bar shows CapEx in tangible assets, meaning investments in our studios. It amounts to just under EUR 5 million in the quarter. The main projects right now, also mentioned earlier, are in the U.S. with Pennsylvania ongoing and Michigan about to start construction. As we have announced, we have scaled down number of tables in many studios, so right now there's no shortage of space.
However, in our plans for this year, is to add one- two mid-sized studios in Europe. The timing of those projects are of course dependent on the COVID-19 situation. The blue part of the bar represents investments in intangible assets and is related to development of new games and features to the platform. It's almost EUR 3 million in the quarter, built up from the same period last year. In the middle of the slide, we show operating cash flow, it's EUR 35 million in the quarter. Affecting cash flow in this quarter is a buildup of accounts receivable by about EUR 14 million in the quarter. As we grow revenue and accounts receivable will increase, so part of that build up is normal. But we have seen the payment cycles extended due to COVID-19.
We have worked together with our operators during the quarter. Many of them are facing a challenging time right now, but ultimately, we're not a credit institution, and we will put an emphasis on collections during the coming quarter. Cash conversion for the 12-month period still on a decent level, but slightly down in the quarter to 72%. Finally, to the right in the slide, a look at the balance sheet. No major changes during the quarter. Our cash assets have increased to EUR 205 million at the end of March. We are in a strong financial position and have been so for some time. Of course, this gives strength coming into an unexpected situation such as the one we are in now.
The annual general meeting has been postponed until June, as announced earlier, due to COVID-19 and the challenges of arranging an AGM tomorrow, which was the original date. As of today, we expect the board to propose the same dividend of EUR 0.42 per share as within the original notice. I will stop here. I will hand back to you, Martin, for some closing words. We'll take questions after that. Thank you.
Thank you, Jacob. A few words to round off this report. I would like to conclude with that I'm proud of how we have started off the year from a financial perspective. I'm even prouder of how we have handled these exceptional times from an operational standpoint. All employees have showed that they are fast-paced, flexible, and that even in hard circumstances, they are able to maintain their focus on our given path to continue to increase the gap to competition and to strengthen our leading position. Everything we do is about that. It's about to extend the gap to competition and strengthen our market leadership. This perpetual mission is a common thread in our studio expansion as well as in our product development, operational excellence, and recruitment.
2020 has started well, and in spite of the situation in the world right now, I look forward to the rest of the year. Thank you all for listening. Now over to questions, please.
Thank you, Martin. If you have a question for the speakers, please press zero one on your telephone keypad now. The first question comes from the line of Lars from Pareto Securities. Your line is open now.
Hi, Martin, and hi, Jacob. Congrats on a really strong report once again.
As always.
If we start with the revenue during the quarter. Can you give us what's March the strongest month in the quarter? Would that be realistic to assume given the COVID-19 situation?
We had a great momentum coming into Q1 from Q4, strong figures in Q4, as you know. I would say that as you also see in the best spots, I mean, we are doing very good in that quarter. The last two weeks or so is the COVID-19 weeks of the quarter. I would say that they don't have a significant impact on the figures in Q1.
Okay. Not a major step up in the end of the quarter. Okay.
We're looking at a strong start of second quarter, but the two weeks don't impact the first quarter that significantly, no.
A question here for Jacob on the personnel cost. It's flat quarter-on-quarter, and part of the reason to the deviation versus mine and consensus estimate. How should we view that? How much is temporary lower personnel cost? I saw that full-time employees grew sequentially. Of course, you are operating a lot less tables at the time. How should we view it?
Going forward?
Yeah. How much is the personnel effect, lower in this quarter?
Well, as Martin said, I mean the effects from COVID-19 and, you know, that is limited in this quarter. It's a little bit of it, of course there. Going forward, it's difficult to say. Right now, as we said, we're operating fewer tables. We've reduced in some instances, you know, terminating probation contracts and the expansion that we were in has, for us a little bit put that way. Long term, we, as we outlined, we see good growth prospects and, yeah, personnel costs will continue to increase, you know, through the year. I don't have a number for you in, for Q2 right now.
Would it be fair to assume that the personnel costs actually will be lower in Q2 given that you operate, I don't know how many less tables you are operating? Are you down to below 500 tables or?
I, as I said, I don't have the Q2 number right now, so I don't wanna speculate on that. I mean, we're operating fewer tables and, you know, part of that will be, it also affects personnel costs. It's just a couple of weeks into the quarter. I don't wanna kind of I don't have the view on second quarter right now.
Can you give some flavor of how many tables you are operating at the moment?
No. We've said we've not given a number. We've said that, you know, we're at reduced capacity. It also varies a lot. I mean, we adapt constantly to the situation. It's reduced capacity right now.
Okay. I was thinking about this with the dedicated table business, how that will be affected in Q2 as well?
That will be affected. I mean, it depends on how long we are, but that's, you know, that's fair. I mean, it will be affected.
I'll make a comment. Of course, it's all depending on how long time this COVID-19 situation continues to be in the world. If it continues for a longer period, you will see effects on, of course, on staffing or personnel costs, as well as you will see effects then on dedicated fees. Again, we just started, quarter two. We have started well and have good momentum.
Okay. On regions, I noticed that the U.K. was down 20% year-on- year. Is there some special event there or is it just operators being more focused on compliance, or is it that Playtech that now is let into the GVC brand is having some negative effects?
A couple of good guesses. All of them wrong, unfortunately. I think the main reason for the drop is that we see operators relocating from U.K. to mainly to Malta. It's where the part of revenue that's more fixed, that's allocated to their billing address. When that moves, then you could say EUR 2 million have gone from U.K. into the Europe category. That said.
Even though we see positive in player numbers, you could say it's a positive count in U.K., it's not a super growth. I mean, we've seen all through last year that it's been almost flat. It's been a market that's lower growth. Long term, we see good potential there. That is the reason for the kind of sudden difference between Q4 and Q1 is that the operators have moved their billing addresses.
Okay. Also on studios, I think you mentioned now in the call, if I was listening correctly, have you started with a Michigan studio? You also said you will build one midsize studio in Europe this year?
Well, okay. We have initiated the project in Michigan, meaning we're talking to the regulator and planning. We're in the planning phase on Michigan. We're in the building phase of Pennsylvania. We're in the investigation and planning phase of one-two new studios in Europe.
What do you mean by midsize studios in Europe? Is it like a multi studio or?
Yeah, something like that. Yes.
Okay. The final question for me here, on Mega Ball, you said promising KPIs in the beta launch. If you compare it to other game show concept that has been launched, how is it holding up? What you have seen so far in the beta test?
I don't wanna get into comparing concepts, of course, it's a fantastic new category. We're expanding again the live segment into new part of the gaming world, attracting new players. The beta was a strong beta test.
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you.
Our next question comes from a caller with an American telephone number ending at one one two. The line is now open.
Hello.
Hello.
This is Casper Cheng from Hong Kong. I'm an individual investor, and I would like to ask for in the light of COVID-19, a lot of sports betting events and land-based casino have came to a halt. Have there been additional operators contacting Evolution for solutions given the needs that arise from lockdowns, or if there are any plans or marketing outreach to operators to close deals and partnerships such as integrating land-based casinos or dedicated tables to cater customer or branding that customer retention of different operators?
My answer to that would be rather that right now, the land-based casinos have a very difficult time to handle operations and the cost base and everything like that as the casinos in many aspects are shut down. What will happen though, and what we see and what we get contact about is that now many land-based casinos that have earlier seen online as a threat turns towards that it's an opportunity. If they would have had online in this situation that they have now, they would have been able to maintain operations and actually give players the experience and player opportunity. I would say that the effect of COVID-19 is an opening of the online market where earlier land-based casinos were reluctant.
Okay. Have there been additional contacts from those land-based operators, or has Evolution been contacting or doing some marketing to those operators to see if they need Evolution's solutions?
We're in constant contact with basically all major operators, both land-based and online. There's no major difference there.
Okay. Good to hear. That's all. Thank you.
Thank you.
The next question comes from the line, with the telephone number ending nine seven three. Your line is now open.
Hello. Good morning. Yes, that might be me, Oscar Erixon from Carnegie here.
Hi.
Uh, two-
Hi.
A few questions from me. First of all, do you expect the strong momentum here in March and April to be of temporary nature, or will it create lasting effects also after the COVID-19 situation? I've heard you speak of very strong customer intake in Q1 and Q2. Could you please elaborate on the potential lasting effects, please?
We have a fantastic product. Of course, I'm happy to introduce that to a lot of new players that haven't seen it before, and I hope that some of them will remain. However, what level and so on is very difficult to say.
All right. You also seem confident in the margin target or rather in improving the margin from last year of 50%. Given close to 56% EBITDA margins in Q1 and strong momentum in Q2, is there any reason to expect lower margins for the rest of the year?
We haven't I mean, the guidance that we've given, as I said, is that, you know, we say that we will increase margins year-over-year. It's a good start. We're not guiding on the margin from quarter-to-quarter. It's, you know, as we grow, we should be able to increase margin, but it can vary, of course, quarter-to-quarter. So, I won't say anything about margins in Q2 specifically.
Okay, great. The final question from me, you might have answered this already, is the studio in Spain now fully up and running with tables or is it mainly the more first-person games? How are the discussions with authorities in Riga and Tbilisi proceeding? Thank you.
Spain is operative, it's fully operative, that's good. We are in constant discussions with all basically authorities in Riga and in Georgia and in Malta. I would say that we're in a good situation right now. Of course, the world is in a place where things change, we're in a good position. We're taking measures, we're actively doing more than what is demanded of us and constantly talking as the largest employer in many of these or a few of these countries. We have a lot to both give and to take from the authorities.
Great. Thank you. Actually, one more question from me. Given the situation in Georgia, and what you had to do there, to scale down the operation a bit, can you please elaborate on the number of employees, compare the average in Q1 and how it was going into April?
We don't comment on the number of employees per month. I'm sorry you have to wait for that until Q2. We have terminated probation employees in Georgia, as well as in Latvia. That is sort of an adjustment. You have to be on to your figures, and that's an adjustment to, for the expansion, which is pushing it bit forward, and we will then come into the recruitment period as soon as we're released out of the COVID-19 situation. A bit like that.
Understood. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
As a reminder, if you have a question for the speakers, please press zero one on your telephone keypad now. We have one more question from telephone line ending six four four two. Your line is open now.
Although I guess it could be me, Rikard Engberg, Erik Penser Bank.
Hi, Rikard.
Hi, I have one question. Could you please shed some light on the Paddy Power deal, signed last year and how that is going?
It's going according to plan. We're happy with the cooperation with them. As we stated before, it's a strategic and very significant deal. However, it won't affect the figures, as we are that large as we are right now. It's going well.
Okay, good. Thanks.
There is one more question, a follow-up from Lars, Pareto Securities. Your line is open now.
Hi again. Just to follow up here on Georgia. When you reopened the studio, you said that you operated on a limited capacity. What does that imply, and where are we now? What do you expect in Q2? When will we be back to normal?
I'll take the last part first. I mean, it's almost impossible. We're in constant discussion with the authorities and the government actually in Georgia on all levels. They are very cautious. Exact time when we can resume operation fully is not, I don't know. We are working on to expand it. Right now we are very limited in capacity in Georgia. It's up and running, but very limited.
Okay. A final question here for Jacob.
Sure.
Considering that you are evaluating possible new studios in Europe, is there any change of the CapEx guidance for the year, would you say?
I would say that's included. The CapEx guidance for the year, as we stated now, is that we say that we will be slightly higher in absolute in EUR terms than 2019. That includes that. We'll see. I mean, it will develop quite a lot. It all depends on kind of how long the current situation is. Even though we are pushing projects ahead and actually are moving, it's of course the pace is affected by the virus situation. But the guidance for the year as it stands today, that will be slightly higher than last year in CapEx.
Okay.
The next question comes from the line of Erik Moberg, ABG. Your line is open now.
Hi, guys. Just a question regarding the rest of Europe segment. Could you perhaps elaborate a bit on the drivers behind the strong growth from this region? I mean, the amount of regulated revenues, the share of regulated revenues is decreasing. I just have a hard time understanding the true drivers behind this segment. Could you perhaps elaborate a bit on what countries are growing at the most rapid rate from this region?
We are launching 12 new products this year, launching 10 products last year. They are fantastic. In spite of the situation with COVID-19, it actually introduces our very good products to new players. As I said, we of course hope that they will be staying there and continue to play them. I would say that the driver for our growth, independent of market, is the good products that we launch. By launching them, increasing the gap competition and continue to expand the Live segment, it's that's the major driver for growth.
What five countries are growing the most at the most rapid rate from this region?
I think that we have taken over the years, good steps towards being disclosing more and more when it comes to geographical split. Lastly, we actually expanded the geographical split to what we have now, also including Asia. I'm very happy with that. In the future, we will look into maybe taking further steps, but right now we haven't done so.
Got it. I assume it's unregulated markets that's growing the most rapid from this region, because when you sort of back out, it appears that it's predominantly unregulated market that is driving this region. Is that correct?
We're growing in all markets. I think that Europe is growing very nicely right now, for example. U.S. is growing fantastically, Asia as well. I see growth in all markets. It's very good, and that's again due to the good products and increase of the gap to competition.
All right. Fair enough. That's all from me. Thank you, guys.
Thanks, Erik.
There seems to be no further questions at this time. I hand it back to the speakers.
Thank you very much for listening. This time we need to say something to round off. It's an exceptional situation in the world. Most important among everything is that we stay healthy and we do what we can for all employees. I again want to say that I'm impressed by the work that all employers and everyone in Evolution is doing. I'm very grateful to have a fantastic talented team pushing forward towards our goals, even during these circumstances that we are right now. Without them, we would be nothing. Thank you very much for listening. Yeah, stay safe is probably the right thing to say these days. Bye.
Bye-bye.