Newgioco Group Updated Investors Amid Covid-19 Spread In Italy

Newgioco Group issued an update for investors regarding the impact of the coronavirus outbreak on their operations, stressing on their fundamentals remaining strong, but warning that the overall negative effect due to the Italian lockdown remained unknown.

Keep Investors Informed

The sports betting and interactive gaming technology company, Newgioco Group, reported that they have already temporarily shut down 150 retail betting shops, in compliance with the restrictions issued by the Italian government, in an attempt to halt the Covid-19 spread. Though the company’s online business operations were not affected by the physical close of retails shops, most of the professional sporting events were cancelled or postponed, which in turn also affected the mobile sports betting handle and revenue of the group.

“We are closely monitoring the active circumstances and the impact of COVID-19 on our product demand and business. Our priority is protecting our employees, supporting our customers and providing timely information to our investors and stockholders”.

Michele Ciavarella, CEO, Newgioco Group

Nasdaq Listing Opened Up New Perspectives

Almost two months ago, on January 14, Newgioco’s CEO rang the opening bell of the New York’s technology exchange Nasdaq, filled with optimism and pride to start a new era for the company and turn it into a global sports betting and interactive gaming technology provider, with fully integrated, omni-channel sports betting software solutions.

Listing the company on the exchange was a completion of a two-year transformation project, involving optimization of its business lines and restructuring of the management team, focusing on rapid growth as a supplier of systems for the expected new sports betting clients as the number of states legalizing online sports books continued to expand.

Since the Covid-19 outbreak, investor expectations that the hospitality and gaming sector would be severely impacted, brought down the prices of stocks for most of the operators, with Newgioco’s share price down more than 40% already.

Online Poker Might Save The Day

Earlier in March, Newgioco reported it reached, through its wholly owned subsidiary Multigioco S.R.L, 7^th place on the regulated online poker ranking list for the Italian market, where the online poker product segment reached approximately $5.6 million in total wagers played in February. The company announced an estimated market share of 4.47%, just a notch behind 888, but way below PokerStars, which 1^st position remained unchallenged at 42.59%.

With more and more sports events off the calendars, and internal and cross-border travel restrictions in place, maybe online poker would throw a lifeline for the gaming industry, and for Newgioco in particular, by turning into a focal point for most sports betting wagers, and help mitigate, if not entirely offset, the negative financial impact of the coronavirus outbreak.