SBC News Ladbrokes Northern Ireland hit by £36 million loss

Ladbrokes Northern Ireland hit by £36 million loss

The Northern Ireland retail betting division of Ladbrokes Plc has posted losses of circa £36 million , just one year after it enjoyed strong profit.

Jim Mullen, Ladbrokes
Jim Mullen, Ladbrokes

 Northwest Bookmakers, which is a subsidiary of Ladbrokes plc, saw its profits slump in the year to December 2014. The company, which trades as Ladbrokes, is the Northern Ireland’s largest bookmaker and holds around a quarter of all shop licences in the region.

A spokesman for Ladbrokes stated that the turnaround in fortunes was mostly the “result of an accounting treatment on our retail estate, not an indicator on problems in the performance of our Northern Ireland business”.

At present  the division says it’s trading well, when the so-called impairments on its shops and property are stripped out. The firm’s staff numbers fell during the course of 2014 however, dropping from 403 a year earlier, to 386.

The overall listed business saw its earnings plunge by 57% during the third quarter of 2015, after being hit by higher gaming taxes and the costs of a major marketing push.

It said UK revenues fell 0.7% in the three months to the end of September compared with a year earlier, when it was boosted by the football World Cup.

Ladbrokes Chief Executive Jim Mullen said of the company’s third quarter results: “These numbers reflect the first 68 days of activity since we announced our organic plan to aggressively invest and grow our recreational and multi-channel customer base, particularly across UK retail, Ladbrokes.com and Ladbrokes Australia. It is early in our journey, but today’s results reflect positive initial progress.”

(Story appeared first on Belfast Telegraph)

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