With the majority of the gambling industry having published their Q3 results, iGB looks at how operators fared in the region and their plans for the future there.
Brazil will launch its legal betting market on 1 January 2025 and one operator that is hoping to make a real dent in the market is the giant Flutter Entertainment.
Back in September, Flutter announced it had agreed to acquire an initial 56% stake in NSX Group, which operates the Brazil-facing Betnacional brand. The deal is worth $350 million (£266.5 million/€316.0 million).
For the nine months ending 30 September, Flutter reported year-on-year revenue growth in Brazil of 4%. In its earnings call following the Q3 results release, CFO Rob Coldrake spoke of the operator’s excitement for the market opening.
“We’re very confident about our approach in Brazil,” Coldrake told reporters. “We’ve grown with our brands that we’ve got there already. We’re very excited about the NSX acquisition.”
The NSX acquisition will create a new ‘Flutter Brazil’ business, which will combine Flutter’s existing Betfair brand with NSX Group’s Pagbet, MrJack.bet and Betpix skins.
“[We] feel that gives us the ability to really kind of push on in Brazil and investing behind that brand in 2025 as we laid out at the Investor Day is something that we’re planning to do and really take advantage of what we think is a very exciting market with lots of opportunity.”
Entain anticipating Brazil growth to plateau after Q3 success
However the launch will bring a wave of new competition for market incumbents. Entain CFO Rob Wood, for example, expects rapid growth in Brazil to slow once the legal market goes live in the New Year.
In its Q3 trading results, Entain posted year-on-year growth of 48% in Brazil revenue, having also achieved that figure in Q2. The success in the country was described by Wood as the “headline grabber” of Entain’s Q3 results. This follows a major operational turnaround, becoming its fastest-growing market.
However, Wood warned growth in Brazil would slow for Entain following the launch of the legal market. The launch brings with it stringent regulations, including new controls for marketing.
Wood told analysts in a conference call on 17 October: “Growth from Brazil in 2025 is likely to be much more moderate. But clearly Brazil is a really important market for us.”
Entain is currently live in Brazil with Sportingbet, one of 223 currently approved to do business in the country until the end of 2024 as part of the transition period.
MGM expecting Brazil launch in January
MGM Resorts CEO and president Bill Hornbuckle expects BetMGM to launch in Brazil in January should it receive a licence.
That follows MGM’s Q3 entry into a strategic venture with Brazil-based Grupo Globo, the largest media group in LatAm. BetMGM’s ability to leverage that media presence will be vital to the deal succeeding in Brazil, Hornbuckle said.
“This venture is meaningful as it allows us to leverage MGM’s LeoVegas technology and gain access to 70 million people providing invaluable insights into Brazil’s consumer market,” Hornbuckle explained on MGM’s Q3 results call back on 30 October. “This aligns with a broader strategy to expand our digital footprint globally and tap into emerging markets.”
Partnerships between operators and media companies have endured mixed results of late, but Hornbuckle feels this venture is different.
“This is not a standard sponsorship deal, this is truly an equity deal,” Hornbuckle explained. “They’ve [Grupo Globo] put in advertising dollars for equity. We love Globo as a partner and its scale. It literally controls about 80% of the eyeballs in Brazil. And we think our product offering is going to be substantive and meaningful.”
Rush Street Interactive taking a cautious approach to Brazil
With a host of high-profile operators looking to make a mark in Brazil, Rush Street Interactive is taking a more patient approach to the market.
Brazil was listed by RSI as a market for “potential expansion” in its Q3 results, with the business already active in other LatAm markets of Mexico, Colombia and Peru. Other markets RSI is considering expansion into include Ecuador, Chile and Argentina.
It is enjoying success in the region too, with RSI CEO Richard Schwartz revealing on a Q3 results call that monthly active users (MAUs) were up 122% year-on-year to 329,000 in LatAm, while revenue was nearly double that of the same period last year.
Despite those achievements, Schwartz and RSI will not rush into Brazil. “Brazil is a really long-term exciting market,” he told analysts on 30 October. “And while we appreciate the long-term opportunity that it presents for us, we continue to take a cautious wait-and-see approach as we want to really sort of evaluate the opportunity relative to all the other opportunities that we are also considering.
“So, I think for this point, we are just going to keep monitoring, tracking it and we will get back when there is something new to share.”
Super Group pulls Betway from Brazil, Betsson observes LatAm growth
Betsson achieved record revenue for the second straight quarter in Q3, powered by growth in regions such as LatAm and Western Europe.
In LatAm, Betsson’s revenue was up 34.2% to a record €69.4 million, driven by casino in markets such as Colombia, Peru and Argentina. Betsson has applied for a licence in the legal Brazilian market and is already active in the transition period with its betsson.com domain.
Many operators are gearing up for the Brazil launch, but one applicant that has withdrawn from the process is Super Group’s Betway, which is one of at least 20 to drop out.
In the post-Q3 results conference call on 6 November, Super Group president and CCO Richard Hasson explained the operator was focusing on other markets, where it can plot a path to profitability.
“Brazil is obviously being spoken about a lot across the industry at the moment,” Hasson said. “That’s a market where we are not currently proceeding in line with all markets that we look at.”
Meanwhile, Kambi CEO Werner Becher outlined the “exciting opportunities” for the supplier’s turnkey sportsbook in Brazil, where it expects to go live early next year.
Kambi has already taken over a partnership with operator KTO from a competing provider in Brazil.
