ATHENS (AFX) - Greek lottery operator OPAP said its full year 2005 group sales rose 16.3 pct year-on-year to 3.695 bln eur under IFRS accounting standards, beating analysts' consensus expectations.
OPAP said that its largest betting game Stihima's revenues fell 10.8 pct year-on-year to 1.438 bln eur, but that a strong fourth quarter mitigated the 23.3 pct drop in the first nine months. However revenues from numerical games were up 46.7 pct to 2.176 bln eur, driven by Kino performance.
OPAPs CEO, Basil Neiadas, said that the changes implemented to its fixed odds betting game Stihima have been very effective in reviving the game, given its strong performance since the fourth quarter and beyond.
Full year EBITDA was up 8.4 pct to 714.3 mln, again above the top of the range of forecasts of 683 mln eur, from an adjusted figure of 658.9 mln eur in 2004.
Group net profits fell 9.4 pct to 458.3 mln eur from 505.6 mln eur, but had been expected to fall 13.6 pct to 437 mln eur, since 2004 figures had been swelled by Intralot arbitration provisions. OPAP added that adjusted net profit was actually up 11.9 pct on comparable 2004 figures of 409.4 mln eur.
OPAPs board will be proposing a 2005 full year dividend of 1.42 eur per share, which is lower than the 1.48 eur for 2004. The company has already paid an interim dividend of 0.48 per share, and will be paying an additional 0.94 eur per share.
Source: Euro2day.gr, Athens skrekas@euro2day.gr ns/cmr COPYRIGHT Copyright AFX News Limited 2005. All rights reserved. The copying, republication or redistribution of AFX News Content, including by framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of AFX News. AFX News and AFX Financial News Logo are registered trademarks of AFX News Limited
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