888 casino company releases improved profit numbers

888 casino is in the general casino news for releasing results following an unsuccessful takeover approach by William Hill earlier this year. Online casinos and other online gambling is big business and there is often speculation about who is buying whom and in fact there were reports in this online casino news section about Bwin and Amaya Gaming from Canada but recently William Hill offered to buy 888 for what was reported to be 200p per share but it seems the deal was scuppered by the majority shareholders. The online casino of 888 known as 888 casino is part of 888 holdings which has two shareholders in the Shaked family and the Ben-Yitzhak family that have nearly 60% of the company between them so it is clear that nothing happens without their agreement. As the online casino groups share price is well below the reported offer price it was interesting to hear what Chief Executive Brian Mattingly had to say. True to say that the share price has increased in the last three years and that profit increases have been due to expanding turnover rather than cutting costs but the question raised is how long this can continue in what is a very competitive market in online casinos. The answer seems to be that 888 casino is open to an all share merger rather than a takeover but the problem there is of course that there are few big boys around of equal size. The group had probably hoped that the US market would have opened up by now but as has been reported many times there is an anti online casino lobby that although not expected to succeed in stopping online casinos are certainly slowing down the process. In the meantime 888 holdings reported increased profits in 2014 of some $68 million.