Earnings call transcript: Kambi Q4 2024 reveals revenue growth, stock drops

Kambi Group PLC (KAMBI) reported its fourth-quarter earnings for 2024, showing a slight increase in revenue to €44.5 million from €44.3 million in the same period last year. Despite the revenue growth, the company’s stock price fell by 8.31% in pre-market trading, reflecting investor concerns over future challenges and guidance. According to InvestingPro analysis, the company maintains strong financial health with an impressive gross profit margin of 98.44% and holds more cash than debt on its balance sheet.

Key Takeaways

• Kambi’s Q4 revenue rose slightly year-over-year to €44.5 million.
• The company’s stock price dropped by 8.31% following the earnings release.
• Expansion into Brazil and new AI-driven products highlight growth potential.
• Cost-saving measures include eliminating 65 roles, aiming to reduce expenses.
• Future headwinds include potential impacts from Kindred migration and tax changes.

Company Performance

Kambi’s financial performance in Q4 2024 showed resilience with a slight revenue increase to €44.5 million compared to €44.3 million in the prior year. The full-year revenue also saw a rise, reaching €176.4 million from €173.3 million in 2023. The company’s focus on AI-driven trading and expansion into new markets like Brazil highlights its strategic growth initiatives. InvestingPro data shows the stock is currently trading below its Fair Value, suggesting potential upside opportunity. The company’s strong liquidity position is evidenced by a healthy current ratio of 3.75, indicating robust short-term financial stability.

Financial Highlights

• Revenue: €44.5 million in Q4, up slightly from €44.3 million in Q4 2022.
• Full Year Revenue: €176.4 million, up from €173.3 million in 2023.
• Earnings per Share: €0.515, an increase from €0.488.
• EBITDAK: €7.1 million in Q4; €25.3 million for the full year.
• Net Cash Position: €61.3 million.

Earnings vs. Forecast

Kambi’s Q4 revenue exceeded the forecast of €42.92 million, reflecting a positive surprise. However, the stock’s negative reaction suggests that investors were concerned about other factors, such as forward guidance and potential risks.

Market Reaction

The company’s stock price fell by 8.31% in pre-market trading, dropping from €120.3 to €110.3. This decline comes despite the revenue beat and may be attributed to concerns over future challenges and strategic changes.

Outlook & Guidance

Kambi provided guidance for 2025, projecting EBITDAK between €20-25 million. The company expects revenue growth from its Brazilian market entry and new product launches, though it acknowledges potential challenges from Kindred migration and tax changes. InvestingPro analysis reveals the company’s strong cash flow generation, with a notable free cash flow yield and sufficient cash flows to cover interest payments, supporting its expansion plans.

Executive Commentary

CEO Werner Becker emphasized the company’s commitment to AI, stating, "AI is not a buzzword for us." He also highlighted the importance of diversifying their customer base, saying, "We want to diversify our customer structure."

Risks and Challenges

• Potential impacts from Kindred migration and tax changes.
• Market saturation and regulatory changes in key markets.
• Execution risks related to new market entries and product launches.
• Cost-saving measures, including job cuts, may affect morale and operations.

Q&A

During the earnings call, analysts questioned the company’s confidence in its new margin guidance and the potential impact of AI on trading. Executives expressed optimism about their business pipeline and efficiency improvements, despite some customer migrations.

Full transcript - Kambi Group PLC (KAMBI) Q4 2024:

Matthias Pritcheff, SVP, Sustainability and Investor Relations, Kambi: Good morning, everyone, and welcome to Canby’s Q4 presentation. My name is Matthias Pritcheff. I am SVP, Sustainability and Investor Relations. I’m here today with our CEO, Werner Becker and CFO, David Kenyon. We will start with the presentation and then we will have time for your questions.

Or you can write them to me in the chat. So the agenda for today, we will start with some highlights with Werner and then David will speak about the financials and the outlook for next year. Then Werner will come back and speak about some commercial and strategic updates as well as the summary. Following that, we will have time for the Q and A. With that, I hand over to Werner.

Werner Becker, CEO, Kambi: Thank you, Matthias, and good morning. In recent months, we have been continuing to build strong foundations for the future. We delivered a robust financial performance in Q4 in the face of various headwinds. Revenue of €44,500,000 was supported by another quarter of strong operator trading margin. So today, we increased our expected long term trading margin.

It was great to see Brazilian market go live at the start of the year and we are live with a number of partners, including recent signings, STEC and KTO. Early in Q4, we signed an Autzfit plus deal with Hard Rock Digital in The U. S. Along with Ray du Pitacco in Brazil. And finally, just a couple of days ago, we entered a novation agreement with Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation and FTJ Group, which pending some conditions will see us take over the long term contract from FTJ Group presenting an exciting opportunity for us.

Meanwhile, we continue to address our cost base by realizing further synergies and implementing efficiency measures in all areas of our business. 2024 was certainly an eventful year at Kemby during which we were able to lay the foundations for future success, which I’d like to summarize on this slide. There has been some change within leadership. At the AGM, Anders Strem was confirmed as Chair, while Christian Nielen took up a seat on the Board, having earlier indicated he would step down from his position as CEO. As the two co founders of Camby and with huge knowledge of the industry, it’s great to have their continued involvement in the business.

We were also grateful to have industry veteran, Benjie Czerniak, join the Board. His experience in the sports betting space over many years has been invaluable. And of course, I succeeded Kristi in late July and I too made a few appointments as I look to build a team capable to taking Camby to the next level. In September, we unveiled our new product portfolio, an important step on Camby’s journey to becoming the home of premium sports betting solutions. The turnkey sportsbook is our flagship product and one which gives all our modular solutions a clear edge over the competition.

The new models are already opening doors to operators that had been closed to us as a pure turnkey supplier. While he will also play a strategic role in helping us retain relationships with operators who decide to move away from the turnkey, Raydo Butacco being a recent example of it. As ever, we made some key new turnkey sportsbook signings with the likes of KTO and STAYK IN BRAZIL, along with U. S. Tribe, Shocktor Nation.

We signed some important partnership extensions as those with Rush Street Interactive and Pan Entertainment. In recent days, we also announced an extension with BetCity, part of NTAIN Group. And we signed various partnerships across our product portfolio, including those with Hard Rock Digital, Ray du Pitacco, Kindred and Svenska Spell. Of course, we’ve seen some movement in the opposite direction with Leo Vegas in the summer, informing us that they are set to transition off our turnkey over the next couple of years. But the foundations we are laying, the diverse customer base we are building will further reduce the reliance we have had on a small number of large partners.

And finally, we focused even more on building out our unique AI capability at KemBI. AI is not a buzzword for us. We are currently using AI to manage our largest sport, soccer, and over the next few quarters, we’ll extend this step by step to additional sports. As a result, improving our product while also reducing costs. As I’ll explain a little later, AI is transforming the way we price, trade and risk manage markets, particularly those that are more complex and almost impossible for humans to run effectively, such as pet builders and player props.

AI today already drives approximately 30% of our operator GGR, And that’s only going to increase over the next quarters. From an operational perspective, we are also increasingly embracing how AI can improve how we perform our day to day tasks, enabling us to be more efficient and productive. Handing over to you.

David Kenyon, CFO, Kambi: Thank you, Werner. Good morning, everyone. Revenue for Q4 was 44,500,000.0, up from 44,300,000.0 in Q4 last year. For the full year, revenue was 176,400,000.0, up from 173,300,000.0 last year. With our OpEx in line with our guidance, this led to earnings before interest tax and amortization on acquisitions, which I’ll call EBITDAK from now on, of 7,100,000.0 and 25,300,000.0 for the full year, in line with 2023.

Our EPS was 0.515 up from 0.488 benefiting from the buybacks we carried out during the year. And our net cash position at the year end was €61,300,000 with our balance sheet remaining in a very healthy position. Here is the operator turnover index for the turnkey sportsbook and it aggregates the performance of all the operators we work with. On a turnover, the turnover level was 7.78 on the index. This was up 13% from Q3 benefiting from the usual seasonality of the sporting calendar with a full quarter of NFL, NBA, and college basketball.

The growth was mitigated from Q3 to some degree by Q3 having the final stages of the euros and the Copa America, and also introduction of tighter regulatory conditions in The Netherlands from October. The operator trading margin across the network was 10.1. Although there were player friendly results in American football, they were favorable for Us soccer results, and we also saw an increased use of higher margin products, for example, bet builders. Our cash at the start of the quarter was 60,500,000.0. We repurchased shares during the quarter to a value of 3,300,000.0, but nevertheless driven by our operating profits, cash increased to 61,300,000.0 by the end of the quarter.

We announced a new buyback program for up to €12,000,000 in November, which will run through to the AGM in May. This was in line with the capital allocation policy to return capital to our shareholders. And by the time of the AGM, we will have returned and accumulated 38,000,000 since we first started the buyback programs. Here I’ll present the outlook for 2025. Firstly, you’ll see that we’re presenting for the first time an EBITDAK metric as our outlook.

This metric represents the underlying profits of the business. And I think it’s more relevant right now for the business given the volatility in some of the revenue factors which I’ll come to in terms of new signings, new products, operator migrations, the changing regulatory landscape, and new gaming and other taxes. Having this EBITDAX metric allows us to manage our cost base to help achieve the numbers I’ll set out here.

Oskar Rehnquist, Analyst, ABG: Oops. Go back. Sorry.

David Kenyon, CFO, Kambi: EBITDA is calculated by excluding amortization on the acquired and acquired intangibles, which is a non cash acquisition related expense, and this adds back around 5,200,000.0 to our EBIT. So firstly, the factors affecting our revenue this year. In terms of organic growth, first thing to mention is the impact of the increased operator trading margin we expect, which it will grow from just under 10% to our new expected level in the range of 9.5% to 11%. Secondly, we see general network growth in the operator turnover across the network, which contributes to this organic growth pile in the waterfall here. And lastly, there was a full year effect of the 2024 launches, including Svenska Spell and LiveScore, which both went live mid twenty twenty four.

In terms of the 2025 launches, there are various elements. Firstly, Brazil, where we see revenues starting from both KTO and STEC. Then there’s the ODDSPEED plus product, where we’re also starting Q1 with revenues from Hardrock and Ray de Pataco. There are other smaller launches also included in this pile here. And finally, OLG, which we announced this week, which assumes a second half of the year go live.

We also mentioned we’ll actually see a non recurring cost of $2,000,000 to $3,000,000 in relation to this launch, which is needed for product and front end development and some retail integration and which will show as an item affecting comparability as it’s a pure one off. In terms of transition fees, we’ve talked about these in the past, but particularly, Penn National Gaming (NASDAQ:PENN), where we received seven months of fees in 2024 and Napoleon Gaming, where we received a full year of fees. Both of these are non recurring headwinds. In terms of operator migrations, as Werner mentioned, we’re expecting impacts from both Kindred and Las Vegas. Here in 2025, the bigger impact is from Kindred, where we’ve already seen the exit of the .com and U.

S. Markets, and we expect certain potentially certain more migrations in the second half of the year, although the timing is at this stage uncertain. In terms of LEO Vegas, we see a small impact in 2025 and there are some other small customer churn factors also accounted for here. This particular headwind can be expected to grow in 2026 as the Kindred contract comes to an end at the end of that year and the LEO migration could accelerate in 2026. Gaming tax and other includes a variety of factors also.

Firstly, Colombia, where there was a recently introduced 19% VAT on deposits. The impact that this will have on player behavior and the market all in all is uncertain, but we estimate a 3,000,000 to 5,000,000 impact on our revenues in 2025. There have also been other gaming tax increases which will affect us. Notably in Sweden, The Netherlands and Illinois with also expected tax raises in Ohio and Indiana. And this pile also includes previously mentioned impact of commission rate changes upon renewal of certain key partners.

Moving now to the costs. Firstly, there were some inflationary pressures on our cost base. We expect a 2,000,000 increase in the data costs as we grow our client network. Each client comes with some fixed costs in the data that’s driving that increase. We also expect an increase in our infrastructure costs, particularly in terms of network cloud costs to service the level of operators, data and territories in our forecast, including Brazil and OLG.

With that said, as Werner mentioned, we’ve undergone quite major cost saving initiative to realize synergies and efficiencies across the business. 65 roles have already left the business and we’ve made savings in a wide range of areas. We’ll continue to seek more efficiencies, but this program enables us to anticipate a cost decrease despite the inflationary factors I mentioned. And we expect total expenses to fall from 156,300,000.0 to the range of 150,000,000 to $155,000,000 So all in all, there are a number of revenue headwinds, some of which are temporary, but we have strong commercial momentum across the product portfolio. And with the cost saving initiative, we’re taking an active step to maximize our efficiency.

On this basis, we estimate EBITDAK for 2025 in the range of 20,000,000 to 25,000,000. With that, I’ll pass you back to Werner.

Werner Becker, CEO, Kambi: Commercial momentum is a term overly used, but this certainly applies to Canby at this time. At the end of Q3, we launched our new product portfolio and we are already seeing great interest. We are very excited about the prospects for our Ots Feed Plus product. As I explained in the previous quarter, there are various benefits to what we offer compared to alternative suppliers. Not least, our €17,000,000,000 network turnkey liquidity and that our odds are traded on it.

A volume of data points needed for AI, only very few in the industry have. In Q4, we signed with Hardrock Digital and Ray to Bitaco two ODDs Feed Plus with both live in January. And the sales pipeline here looks promising. In continuing to build upon our strong relationship with Stripes, we signed a turnkey sportsbook partnership agreement with Wind Creek in Illinois. And Schachter Nation will add our native front end solution to their sportsbook and casino.

Moving to Q1, it’s been an incredible busy start of the year. I’ve already mentioned the launch in Brazil and in parallel we signed a turnkey sportsbook partnership with Stake. STEG is one of the largest operators in the world, ranked top 20 in the EGR Power Rankings. The operator is now focused on building out its regulated business and selected Kemi to be its partner in certain regulated markets, starting with Brazil. This partnership relates to licensed markets via real money payments only, but Stake certainly has the capital to invest in growing this regulated business over time.

Esports is another modular product within our portfolio that’s been gaining traction, illustrated by the recent agreement with Kindred Group. Kindred will integrate Aebers powered Esports to its in house sportsbook. Part of the Esports package is Esports odds, which Kindred will take via our OddsFeed plus API, making it very easy for Kindred to take also odds from other sports from Cambie in future. This kinder deal comes shortly after Swenska Spell also added an esports package to its turnkey sportsbook. And most recently in Q1, we signed a multi extension with BetCity, one of the largest sportsbooks in The Netherlands.

Bet City was acquired by Entain in 2022. So that Bet City has decided to remain on the Cambie platform for another period of time underscores the quality of our product and services. On Monday, we announced that we had entered into an innovation agreement with Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation and FDG Group to take over FDG’s sportsbook responsibilities to OLG pending certain conditions. In short, once we’ve satisfied these conditions, which we are very confident we will, we will become the new sportsbook partner of OLG, an operator of significant size and stature with a contract running until 02/1932. Up until 2022, OLG with its Pro Am brand held the sports betting monopoly in the Canadian province.

It operates a large retail business through approximately 10,000 outlets, where the majority of its sportsbook revenue is generated. Following the reregulation of sports betting in Ontario, the online market has become much more competitive. I believe there is a great opportunity for LG to strengthen its position also in the online space with Cambie. As mentioned from David, there is an initial non recurring cost implication of around €2,000,000 to €3,000,000 which is related to certain product adaption and integrating, pools betting product integration into the lottery application, etcetera. All being well, we should launch in the second half of the year.

We also recently gained the license required to enter the Nevada market after receiving approval from the state regulator. This brings to an end an extensive process with the regulator leaving no stone unturned in its thorough checks to ensure only the most compliant and transparent businesses can operate throughout Nevada. We are delighted to have cleared Nevada’s highly recorded bar, look forward to commencing operations there, which we expect will begin with the field test at Belize Lake Cajot territory in the coming quarters. In what’s yet another example of our commitment to regulated market, in Q4, the percentage of Cambys revenues coming from licensed markets reached 98%, a number which will only be strengthened moving forward by our recent launches in Brazil. I’m delighted to say from day one, from January 1 on, Kambi is live in the licensed Brazilian market.

At present, we are live with five partners in Brazil, Four with our turnkey sportsbook, BetMGM, BetWarrior, KTO and our new partner Stake along with Ryto Bitaco with Otsvid plus With a large population and a love for sports, particularly soccer, Brazil is a country of great potential for Cambie and we are very happy with the collection of partners we are supporting there. As we anticipated prior to launch, the market will take some time to reach its full potential. With operators currently contending with various compliance teasing issues, which tends to be the case in EU regulated markets. However, there are signs that the situation is improving, turnover have been steadily up on the rise. And please don’t forget that Brazil in soccer is currently on summer break and the new season will only start March.

Following a series of historically high operator trading margins, today we are raising our expected operator trading margin from 8% to 9% to 9.7% to 11%. There are two main reasons for this. First, a more structural change whereby players are increasingly betting on higher margin products like bed builders, meaning a higher theoretical margin. And second, our ability to not only offer all these complex products, but also to deliver an actual margin getting very close to that of the theoretical margin, so offering a financially secure and very profitable way for these products. One way to illustrate this is by showing you the increase in pre match soccer bed builders in recent years, which was responsible for 16% of turnover in 2024, up from 10% last year and fast approaching 30% of operator GGR, up from 21% in the year before.

All the related contingencies involved in bed builders and other cross sports multi poly products make these very complex products to price, trade and risk manage effectively. Something we believe is fast becoming impossible to do by human driven trading systems and static algorithms. Through fully AI powered automation, Cambys able to offer a broader product while simultaneously managing the odds and liabilities to deliver healthy margins. We’ve seen the results of this for a number of months now, including the current quarter, giving us confidence to raise our long term expected operator trading margin. So to recap, we closed out the year with a robust financial performance, a strong cash position and we continue to turn capital to shareholders through our buyback program.

We have initiated an efficiency program and will continue to reduce costs going forward. We are seeing great commercial momentum across our product portfolio with recent partner signings supporting long term revenue growth. These elements and more demonstrate how we are building strong foundations for the future. Thank you, Werner.

Matthias Pritcheff, SVP, Sustainability and Investor Relations, Kambi: And with that, we open up for questions. So the first question comes from Oskar Rehnquist at ABG. Please go ahead.

Oskar Rehnquist, Analyst, ABG: Perfect. Thank you very much. My first question would be on the guidance on the revenue side. So first, the bars on organic growth and 2025 launches. So just wondered a little bit about the assumptions.

Have you sort of put out the figures that you feel very comfortable with delivering? Or is it more like a midpoint of your expectations? So are you just trying to get a sense of any potential conservative assumptions or not?

David Kenyon, CFO, Kambi: No, I’d say Hi, Oscar. I’d say this is pretty much the midpoint of our assumptions. There are, of course, some uncertainties in the numbers, which is why we have to end up with a range of but only 5,000,000 on EBITDAK for the full year. But yes, this is the midpoint of our

Oskar Rehnquist, Analyst, ABG: assumptions. All right. Perfect. And also on the 2025 launches bar, just wondered if that excluding any unannounced signings or do you need to put out more signings during 2025 and more launches to reach that number?

David Kenyon, CFO, Kambi: Yes, there is a little bit built in there for more signings and kind of as yet on launch, but the vast majority of that, I’m pleased to say, is under contract. Now, potentially also include with the ORG signing. So the vast majority, I’d say, is relatively secure. But there are, yes, we still, of course, hope to sign some more during the year and get them launched during the year.

Oskar Rehnquist, Analyst, ABG: Got it. Perfect. And then just on if you could repeat a little bit on the migration. So you expect LEO, was that the decline was supposed to accelerate in 2026, but already starting in late twenty twenty five. Was that the correct assumption?

David Kenyon, CFO, Kambi: Yes. So in our working sales, quite a small impact in 2025, but anticipated that probably will accelerate in 2026. But yes, in these numbers here, it’s actually the majority is more from the Kindred migration.

Oskar Rehnquist, Analyst, ABG: Okay. So the majority of the migrations is Kindred related and that would be more towards the latter part of 2025 as well?

David Kenyon, CFO, Kambi: Well, you have there you have the markets they’ve already exited, which impacts on the 2025 numbers, so both U. S. And the .com markets. And then we have some expectation there may be more migrations. We’re not sure exactly when, but likely second half of the year.

So we’ve made an estimate there.

Oskar Rehnquist, Analyst, ABG: Yes. Got it. And I know that you may not be able to answer this, but can you say anything on the EUR 55,000,000 minimum guarantees? Is that a very low assumption for the EUR 24,000,000 to EUR 26,000,000 accumulated revenue now that it feels like the big sort of migration is happening maybe a little bit later than they initially expected?

David Kenyon, CFO, Kambi: Hard to comment on that really. We don’t know the exact timings and whether it will all be done by the end of twenty twenty six at this stage. But in terms of the 55,000,000, it’s certainly front loaded to some degree as the migration happens later in that period. So that’s why we talked about that headwind as being the one that could potentially increase in 2026.

Oskar Rehnquist, Analyst, ABG: Yes, perfect. Just also a little bit data, the Colombia VAT and I mean you also interpret it to be only impacting 2025 and then you can get sort of a relief maybe into 2026. That’s correct. And also that’s not a cost for you, right? It’s just that it could be some lower channelization due to that.

Is that the SEK 3,000,000 to SEK 5,000,000 impact that you expect?

David Kenyon, CFO, Kambi: Correct, yes. That’s exactly as we see it, yes.

Oskar Rehnquist, Analyst, ABG: Got it. Thank you. That was all for me. Thank you.

David Kenyon, CFO, Kambi: Thank you.

Matthias Pritcheff, SVP, Sustainability and Investor Relations, Kambi: Thank you, Oscar. And then we move to George from Pareto, please.

George, Analyst, Pareto: Good morning and thanks for taking my questions. So just to clarify that contribution from Melio and Kindred in ’twenty five, how much will start in absolute terms in the waterfall?

David Kenyon, CFO, Kambi: We haven’t put specific numbers on it, but I mean the graph is to scale and obviously it does end up in a range. So none of those numbers are meant to be kind of exact numbers. But I think it’s in the region of if you get your rule out in the region of million, I think, for that total migration impact.

George, Analyst, Pareto: Yes. And most of that related to Kindred. And in Q4, could you comment anything on the growth excluding Kindred? Q4.

David Kenyon, CFO, Kambi: Year on year versus Q3 are you interested in?

George, Analyst, Pareto: Year on year.

David Kenyon, CFO, Kambi: Year on year. Yeah, I mean, all in all, obviously, it was kind of flat year on year in total, but there was some impact. Yes, probably one of the single biggest impacts versus Q4 was Kindred, both in terms of the markets they left and the impact of the new regulatory conditions in The Netherlands, which came in, in October. So that probably was the single biggest kind of headwind we faced on the operator turnover.

George, Analyst, Pareto: Okay. But it was flat excluding Kindred also. I assume you have lower revenues from Kindred in Q4 this year compared to last year?

David Kenyon, CFO, Kambi: No, it’s flat. I’m just saying flat in total, but within that, there was a headwind from the Kindred turnover.

George, Analyst, Pareto: Okay. And on the sports betting margin guidance, what’s your sort of comfort in these new numbers? Because you’re obviously not the only player in the industry that’s seen quite high margins in ’twenty four. If you could just talk about how comfortable you are in putting out that new guidance.

Werner Becker, CEO, Kambi: We feel very confident about this new margin guidance. So having followed rising margin already over some quarters now, especially now seeing the performance of our Tesseract powered fully automated AI solutions, we’re even more confident that the broader product we can supply to customers and the very healthy margin with AI powered tools we will be able to deliver will even further increase the margin going forward.

George, Analyst, Pareto: Okay. And just some more color on the OLG signing here. Because you take over the contracts from SDJ, is there any component of rev share or similar to that? Because I guess SPJ could have given it to some of your competitors also who probably would be willing to pay for it.

Werner Becker, CEO, Kambi: Yes. So in 2022, OLG run a public tender and FTJ was the winner of this tender. But after FTJ decided to fully focus on B2C business, FTJ internally, they run a process And we’re very proud that the selected Kambi as being recommended to OLG as their successor. We entered now into this innovation agreement. So there are some more documents to be signed in the next few weeks and months.

And they are under subject and conditions. But the commercial sensitive information, of course, I can’t share here.

George, Analyst, Pareto: Okay. But you can’t comment if there is any financial compensation to FPGA here?

Werner Becker, CEO, Kambi: From Cambie? No.

George, Analyst, Pareto: Yes. Okay. And on that onetime cost related to this signing, I don’t really follow why that’s a one off. I assume you have similar costs when going live with other clients.

David Kenyon, CFO, Kambi: Yes. I mean, I think it’s really it’s outside the what we need to build to fulfill that contract outside the normal scope of what we do for our network. So it’s a it really is a one off to secure that contract, the work we need to carry out. And that cost will end. It will be finite within the year and it will end.

George, Analyst, Pareto: Yes. But surely you have upfront contracts upfront costs for other signings as well if they’re big and they want to tailor to their needs.

Werner Becker, CEO, Kambi: Yes. But as you know, we run a multi tenant solution and onboarding new customers doesn’t normally come with a lot of effort for us. It’s about integrating into the PAM. That’s what is standard and what we’re used to. But looking to a more complex landscape, we are now facing with OLG, especially to provide a pools betting product to them and also integrate fully into their lottery application and into their 10,000 retail shops is a little bit out of scope what we normally do.

George, Analyst, Pareto: Okay. That’s clear. Just a final question, more of a high level question, I guess, because we’ve seen the rise of the poly market and all of these other crypto related betting sites. Could Can you comment on your views and takes on this sort of rise in a new competitor?

Werner Becker, CEO, Kambi: Yes. So of course, we follow these developments in The U. S. Very closely. I think it’s very unclear for everyone if betting is now allowed in 50 states of The U.

S, yes or no. I think it’s important to understand that prediction markets work in a very different way than, let’s say, managed sportsbooks are. Their offering is normally very small. It’s yesno. And the offering is also still very small.

But of course, being allowed to offer in states where betting not is not regulated already today could be a threat for the existing betting operators in The U. S, if others take over market share very early in these unregulated states already. But it could be also an opportunity that drives regulation even faster in The U. S.

George, Analyst, Pareto: Yes. And you’re not interested in expanding your offering to have something similar to that?

Werner Becker, CEO, Kambi: Yes, for sure we

Oskar Rehnquist, Analyst, ABG: are. Okay.

George, Analyst, Pareto: That’s all I have. Thank you very much.

Matthias Pritcheff, SVP, Sustainability and Investor Relations, Kambi: Thank you, George. So there are no more questions on the telephone, so we will move over to the chat. First question is regarding the cash position and the future of buybacks. So we have previously indicated cash position of around SEK 40,000,000 is appropriate. So maybe, David, if you can comment about the future of the cash position and potential additional buybacks.

David Kenyon, CFO, Kambi: Yes. To start with, I mean, we have over 60,000,000 on the balance sheet at year end, but we also have a the board announced a 12,000,000 buybacks program, and we still have much of that to use. So 8,700,000.0 of that is still to run from the year end through to the AGM. So, you know, we’ll put that 60,000,000 to good use for more buybacks, and then we’ll probably, like, quite likely seek further mandate for next year at the AGM to to be confirmed. That that 40,000,000, I mean, that that should grow with the business.

So as the business gets more complex, more operators, more more diverse, more products, you know, you that that number can maybe increase. But, you know, I think we’ll we’ll always try and set a sensible balance where that number is, 40,000,000, 40 5 million, maybe 50,000,000 when we get bigger.

Matthias Pritcheff, SVP, Sustainability and Investor Relations, Kambi: And second question is about the relationship with Kindred and FTJ. So you seem to have a good relationship with additional contracts. What does the future look like with this relationship? And could you take over potentially other clients from FTJ as well?

Werner Becker, CEO, Kambi: Yes. So first of all, I think everyone will understand working with these guys now for many years. They’re probably already friends, right? So for sure, we’re very close to them and we are in continued talks with them about how to also support them long term going forward in future, which are modular products. So, yes, FTJ announced that they will fully focus on B2C.

And we are happy that FTJ selected us as their successor for 1G. There are a lot of other opportunities for us out there now, but I think it’s too early to speculate about how many of them we will secure for Kemby.

Matthias Pritcheff, SVP, Sustainability and Investor Relations, Kambi: Thanks. Next (LON:NXT) question for you, David. Could you maybe pan out a little bit how the year will play out on the guidance? Previously, you have provided the operating cost guidance per quarter. So could you maybe say like is there more to come in the second half of the year?

Or what does the sort of quarter by quarter look like a little bit?

David Kenyon, CFO, Kambi: Yes. That’s a good question because that outlook we gave 2025, I think it will be quite backloaded. And that’s for two main reasons. One is the seasonality of the sporting calendar we see every year. Q4 is when you really see the revenue growth because of that seasonality.

And then also the those cost initiatives, which I mentioned, we’re going to keep looking at more efficiencies. So So the benefit to those cost savings will become more apparent during the year. So those two factors mean it will look a little bit backloaded. So that’s what we should expect.

Matthias Pritcheff, SVP, Sustainability and Investor Relations, Kambi: Thank you. Next question for you, Werner. You served as CEO since mid-twenty twenty four. What do you see as the greatest opportunities for both growth and improvement going forward?

Werner Becker, CEO, Kambi: I would say two things. So what I heard from so many customers in my first few months is that Canby offers by far the best product out there. This is, of course, a very strong position we are in. I think offering now a broader portfolio of products, especially our Ots Feed Prost product getting a lot of traction on the market now is a very good opportunity for us. But as I mentioned earlier in this call, I think that Canby started already three years ago to go Foil Inn in AI and to become AI first company is also very, very important.

We run the five biggest sportsbook on this planet and for AI it’s so important to have big data. Without big data you can’t really use AI. And only a few companies, including Kemby, are in a position and will be in a position in future to fully leverage the capabilities of AI, which will bring us even a stronger position.

Matthias Pritcheff, SVP, Sustainability and Investor Relations, Kambi: Thanks. Next question about is about the ODDs Feed Plus product. What sports have you already launched and will we see more?

Werner Becker, CEO, Kambi: Yes. So we have launched all sports. But as explained in the last quarterly earnings call, the odds feed model on the market is a very different one to the turnkey model. For the turnkey model, we normally sign multiyear deals and we are the exclusive partner of operators out there. When it comes to the ODDs feeds, we are in a daily competition with other ODDs feed providers and suppliers.

So operators benchmark us every day against our competitors out there and they pick and choose and select which sports, which markets they want to have delivered from us. But as mentioned, our Otsuit plus product is the only one being fully traded on this huge betting liquidity we have in our turnkey product makes us very, very confident that having tested the first few sports with our Outfit plus product that operators will take more and more.

David Kenyon, CFO, Kambi: And I can add maybe that if we’re successful as we think we’re going to be, that will also add to that back loading effect on EBITAAC through the year. Yes.

Matthias Pritcheff, SVP, Sustainability and Investor Relations, Kambi: Question the second question about sort of FTJ a little bit and monopoly and lottery contracts. Do you have do we think that we have a bigger chance of winning these now than a few years back? Or has anything changed? Or is it just process as usual and you win some and you lose some?

Werner Becker, CEO, Kambi: No, I think so. So first of all, we want to diversify our customer structure. We do not want to be reliant on a few large customers anymore in future. So lotteries are a very important target group for us. With ATG, with Swenskaspel and also with Ontario Lottery, we have now some really nice post deploy clients in this area.

And we know that also a lot of other lottery operators are seeing more and more competition in their home markets. So do not only to have any bedding product, but a premium product is getting so much more important for them. So yes, I see lotteries for us as a very important target group going forward.

Matthias Pritcheff, SVP, Sustainability and Investor Relations, Kambi: Thank you. And then the question about the potential in Nevada and what we see the market there and potential clients and customers in development.

Werner Becker, CEO, Kambi: Yes. So Nevada is a relevant for us and important for us for two reasons. One, Nevada licensing is the clear gold standard in our industry. So not too many B2B supplies in the bedding space are licensed in Nevada because the regulatory bar is so high to get this license. So it’s something like showing clearly that we have an outstanding compliance offering for our customers and they can feel safe that they’re always compliant.

And of course, the Nevada market seeing only very few B2B competitors there being licensed is also an interesting market for us going forward. We’ll start a field test, most probably with Belis de Ho resorts in the next few quarters. And then let’s see.

Matthias Pritcheff, SVP, Sustainability and Investor Relations, Kambi: Thanks. Next question is about Colombia and the SEK3 million to SEK5 million headwind from the VAT. Others have communicated a more neutral impact. Is the SEK3 million to SEK5 million extremely conservative in the EBITDA gain? Should we assume something else?

Werner Becker, CEO, Kambi: I don’t think so. So a 19% VAT tax on deposit is heavy, is very heavy. So do not expect any influence on user behavior, deposits, revenues. I don’t get it, to be honest. So yes, we don’t know today how big the impact will be, but I think Rush Street announced already a few days ago that they also expect a relevant impact and we expect also a relevant impact.

How much bonusing and features keeping sport fans active will help to balance this risk, we will see.

Oskar Rehnquist, Analyst, ABG: Thanks.

Matthias Pritcheff, SVP, Sustainability and Investor Relations, Kambi: So a lot of head we’ve had a lot of headwinds for the last couple of years. And I guess also in 2025. Can you mention anything about coming into 2026 and 2027, what does the future hold?

Werner Becker, CEO, Kambi: Yes. I’m not sure if we talked so much about headwinds. Probably the image is a little bit wrong here. I think to accept some churn is not something we should be surprised about. That’s part of every business out there.

Looking to the new signings we did continuously over the last years, we lost DraftKings (NASDAQ:DKNG), we lost Penn. We now will lose Kindred, we’ll lose BetMGM, but we’re still growing, right? Shows how strong I think our sales pipeline always is. Also now with stake, with Hard Rock, with Ontario, we’ve a very clear track record to bring in a lot of new business. So, yes, there is some short term challenge to be managed in the next, let’s say, eighteen months.

But we are very optimistic about all the new business we are bringing in for turnkey as well as for our new products.

Matthias Pritcheff, SVP, Sustainability and Investor Relations, Kambi: Thank you. And then the last question. The agreement from ABS to supply Kindred, does it give you any further confidence around your ability to continue to work with Kindred post migration? Or more broadly, does it give you confidence that you can continue to serve customers via modules after migration?

Werner Becker, CEO, Kambi: Absolutely. So the clear goal is to, first of all, address with our ODDZ FEED plus product in house sportsbooks where we were closed out in the past only offering a turnkey solution. So this is one target group. But for sure to retain existing customers who decided to go in house is the second angle of our attack here. And Kindred, Leo Vegas, I called them friends a minute ago, right?

For sure, we are in close talks with all of them. And they know the quality of our products, of our odds, of our trading very good. So I feel very comfortable that we will keep them as long term partners on board, but negotiations are ongoing.

Matthias Pritcheff, SVP, Sustainability and Investor Relations, Kambi: Thank you. That were all the questions that we had time for today. Thank you all for listening in. Thank you for presenting. And we look forward to see you in the next couple of days or otherwise we have our representation of Q1 on the April 30 and we’ll see you then.

Thank you very much for the day.

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