That’s the biggest news from today’s earnings call covering 2Q15.
Listen to the call here.
This is Amaya’s first earnings call as a NASDAQ-traded stock. The company began their dual TSX / NASDAQ listing in June. The call also comes just a few days after the one-year anniversary of Amaya’s acquisition of PokerStars.
A non-exhaustive list of items of note, with additional color following:
The full presentation accompanying the call can be viewed here.
There was no mention of New Jersey.
The comes as PokerStars’ NJ saga approaches an anniversary of its own. It’s been almost a year since Amaya filed for a transactional waiver to bring the PokerStars brand and platform to New Jersey’s online poker market.
In the intervening months, there have been bursts of speculation regarding PokerStars’ approval that were inevitably followed by periods of quiet following the passage of a predicted entry date.
Chatter has been especially heavy over the last few weeks.
How PokerStars will impact the New Jersey market is a matter of no small debate. A recent take from Robert DellaFave argues that the best path forward for competing sites would be cooperation.
There was no mention of California.
With only weeks remaining in the 2015 session, all eyes are focused on the return of California lawmakers next Monday.
The emerging storyline is that Amaya and like-minded parties will coordinate a push to bring an online poker bill to the floor for a vote despite the lack of consensus among key stakeholders.
A hearing for AB 167 in front of the Assembly GO Committee is understood to be scheduled for next week.
PokerStars is now set to enter the DFS market following Amaya’s announcement that it has acquired Victiv.
Amaya first telegraphed their intentions to break into the DFS market in early 2015. CEO David Baazov tempered the timeline somewhat in the 1Q15 earnings call in May.
There are an array of opinions regarding the ability of PokerStars to compete in an increasingly crowded DFS field, but there’s no denying that the company enjoys a number of competitive advantages.