A statement with initial Q3 numbers from bwin.party paints a mixed (but unsurprising) picture for the online gaming power. Reaction from the markets seems mildly positive so far, but I’m just interested in what the report has to say about Party Poker.
Here are the quick numbers for PartyPoker from July 2012 through September 2012:
Ouch.
Party says that “trading since the period end has seen a marked improvement”, but traffic data from PokerScout suggests those gains have been a bit spottier than Party might like.
All of the numbers look pretty disastrous, but the headline has to be the 59% year-over-year drop in real-money sign ups. In their half-year report, Party basically blamed the drop on having “amended our contractual relationship in February 2012 with certain of our larger affiliates that had been driving large numbers of marginally profitable players to our sites.”
The fact that the drop subsided from Q2 to Q3 supports this explanation, but doesn’t address the underlying problems:
The only apparent upside of this report: Party looks to have hit something like a bottom.
Party says they plan the “launch of PartyPoker on mobile” for the first half of 2013. That’s a bumped-up timetable from August, when Party was predicting an Android poker client for Q3 2013. No word on whether “on mobile” means just Android or broader suite of apps.
The long-promised overhaul of Party’s software platform, originally billed with a Q1 launch date, has been (subtly) pushed back. The statement now promises a “complete repositioning and relaunch of PartyPoker in the first half of 2013.”
Dotcom poker network integration (bwin players coming over to Party) is still on track for 2012.
Back in August of 2012, Party released a plan to “return poker to growth” that included four core elements. A quarter later, how is Party progressing on each?
To put the whole thing quickly: The plan could probably use a few more points.