By Christopher Kuo
Flutter posted lower first-quarter profit amid a decline in its average monthly players.
The company, which owns the sports betting company FanDuel, saw its total average monthly players decrease 3% to 14.4 million in the first quarter. The decrease was even sharper for FanDuel: Its sportsbook average monthly players declined 6% compared with the same period a year ago.
"We had a smaller business coming into the year than we expected," Flutter Chief Executive Officer Peter Jackson said in an interview. "We ceded a bit of market share last year, but we're getting the business back on the front foot."
Flutter on Wednesday posted a net income attributable to shareholders of $218 million, or $1.23 a share, compared with $283 million, or $1.57 a share, a year earlier.
Adjusted earnings per share came in at $1.22, beating Wall Street expectations of $1.09 a share, according to analysts polled by FactSet.
Revenue rose 17% to $4.3 billion. Analysts were expecting $4.24 billion.
Flutter earlier Wednesday said Amy Howe, who led the company for five years, has left her role as chief executive officer of FanDuel. Christian Gentski, current president of FanDuel, is succeeding her.
"The US market, and FanDuel's leading position within it, represents one of the most significant growth opportunities in our industry, and it is essential that we have the right structure and leadership in place to fully capitalize on it," Jackson said in a letter to shareholders.
The company's shares fell 4% on $99.15 in late market session trading after touching a 52-week low of $97.94. The stock has tumbled 54% this year.
The company has seen only a limited impact from prediction market operators on their sportsbook growth, Jackson said in the letter.
In the first quarter, the company expanded its own prediction betting platform, FanDuel Predicts, nationwide across financial, economic and commodities contracts. In April, the company launched the FanDuel "OneApp," which provides sports betting or prediction markets to customers depending on what is legal in their states.
"We do believe prediction market operators may be attracting some new, incremental entertainment-first recreational customer cohorts, and we continue to monitor the impact of prediction market operators on the broader sports-betting ecosystem," Jackson said.
Write to Christopher Kuo at chris.kuo@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
May 06, 2026 16:11 ET (20:11 GMT)
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