In this episode, Betsson AB CEO Pontus Lindwall discusses the company's recent financial results, regional strategies, and insights from the World Cup, providing valuable perspectives on the iGaming industry.
Key Topics
Betsson's Q2 and H1 financial results
Regional focus on Latam and Europe
Regulatory challenges in Western Europe
Impact of the World Cup on revenue
Strategies for customer retention post-World Cup
Decline in Nordics and CEE regions
B2B and B2C revenue dynamics
Future outlook for Betsson
Host: Charlie Horner
Guest: Pontus Lindwall
Producer: Anaya McDonald
Editor: Anaya McDonal...
What Pontus Lindwall said
Written from the verified transcript and checked against it. Every figure links to the moment it was said.
Pontus Lindwall, President and CEO of Betsson, discussed the company's Q2 and H1 2026 results, reporting record group revenue of 595.5 million euros, an organic increase of 5%. He attributed the growth to the B2C business, noting that the World Cup contributed only about 20 days of activity in the quarter and was more of an acquisition period. Lindwall highlighted Latin America as Betsson's largest region, with Argentina and Peru as key markets, and credited local teams for success. He explained that Western Europe is fragmented, with Italy being a growth market despite regulatory challenges, while the Nordics and CEECA regions saw revenue declines due to reduced marketing investment and regulatory pressures. Lindwall noted that EBITDA decreased 33% mainly due to a loss of profitable B2B revenues from one client, though B2C grew 14%. He expressed optimism about retaining World Cup-acquired customers and hoped for B2B growth quarter-on-quarter.
Key takeaways
Betsson's Q2 2026 group revenue hit a record 595.5 million euros, up 5% organically, driven by B2C growth.
Latin America is Betsson's largest region, with Argentina and Peru as key markets, and receives the most investment.
EBITDA fell 33% to 108.4 million euros, mainly due to a loss of profitable B2B revenues from one large client.
B2C revenue grew 14% in Q2, and marketing spend is kept as a near-fixed share of revenue, increasing with traction.
Lindwall hopes for B2B growth quarter-on-quarter, not necessarily year-over-year, in the near future.
0:27Pontus, thanks ever so much for coming on. How are you doing?
0:52Could you outline what the strategy has been to get to this point and maybe has the opening stages of the World Cup helped to contribute to that milestone?
2:32we've spoken about it a little bit before as well but what was the strategic decision making process to sort of focus heavily on Latam and secondly what is it about your product and brands that resonates with players so much in that region?
4:25But what which markets specifically in Latam are the ones that are sort of driving the best results for Betsson?
4:54Do you see a real opportunity to sort of put the foot down on the gas?
6:29And is that a reflection of maybe the regulatory system in Italy being more favorable than other markets in Western Europe?
8:40Are you seeing that's because again of sort of the regulatory environment in those countries and sort of channelization rates declining as a result?
12:16... seeing that maybe some of the increased regulatory pressure and tax hikes across different markets is sort of cooling the B2B sector in gambling or do you think there are other contributing factors or is it just a sort of individual case?
13:10I guess it's more from a customer acquisition point of view, but how do you go about retaining those customers as well?
14:41What is the strategy to sort of hold on to those customers?
15:04So how do you sort of assess that from a sports betting perspective?
I was very nervous about the first half of the tournament because we saw all those teams that we didn't know what to expect from them and you could see okay there are like 20 games where we're just going to lose money and pay out but those teams stood up you know and they did things that no one did expect.
Welcome back to i Gaming Daily supported by Optimov, the creator of positionless marketing and the number one player engagement solution for sports betting and i gaming operators. Today I'm delighted to be joined by Betsson CEO Pontus Lindwall just after the company published its Q2 and H1 results. Pontus, thanks ever so much for coming on. How are you doing?
No, not a problem. and it's great to have you on the show and we'll have a full piece of coverage on SBC News of those results. But just as a quick overview of some of the numbers, group revenue at 595.5 million euros, an organic increase of 5%. EBITDA at 108.4 million euros, that's a decrease of 33% and operating income at 76.2 million euros. First of all, Pontus, revenue is at all-time high. I think that's driven by the B2C side of the business. Could you outline what the strategy has been to get to this point and maybe has the opening stages of the World Cup helped to contribute to that milestone?
Yeah. the B2C part of our business which is obviously the largest part and where we own the brands and we run the whole operation it has been growing for a very long time and it's been going well now in this second quarter of the year as well and of course boosted a bit by the end of the quarter by the championship but then again we have to remember that it was only around 20 days of the championship in that quarter. So it helps a bit, but it's not what makes the difference really for the results. It's the long-term job that we do within all our B2C business that has made this possible.
Sure. Yeah. I'm sure that the World Cup or particularly those opening stages of the tournament is more of an acquisition period rather than where you actually sort of generate your big results. So I guess it's testament to the operational side of the business that you have managed to get those sort of all-time high revenues during this quarter. Latin America now is Betsson's largest region and there were also record revenues in that region. we've spoken about it a little bit before as well but what was the strategic decision making process to sort of focus heavily on Latam and secondly what is it about your product and brands that resonates with players so much in that region?
I think we started off in Latam a very long time ago and I can say that from the very first day of that I didn't state that it should become our largest region but we have been doing well over there. Thanks a lot to our local teams over there. And I think that is one of the keys to our success that we have always been local in the market or in the different markets over there because they are different between themselves as well. So but after being there for quite some time actually we saw that we had good traction and we decided to invest more and we have been early in the market and with the fact that we had people on the ground and local knowledge we managed to keep the traction also going into new markets that was regulating in LATAM. So it's a very important region for us and now it's the region where we put the most of our efforts into.
Sure. No, it's nice to hear the sort of color on that. But what which markets specifically in Latam are the ones that are sort of driving the best results for Betsson?
I would say we are in many markets there but I would say that Argentina and Peru are two large markets and very interesting now when we have Argentina in the final of the World Cup. It's going to be very interesting to see.
It's still a sore point Pontus. I'm sure my co-host Fur will be much more happy with that. But yeah, it's nice to see that Argentina is contributing so heavily to the business there. Just moving on slightly from Latam and going to Western Europe. That's another region where Betsson is seeing revenue growth. And that's despite a lot of what we would say regulatory pressure in the region as well and tax pressures. How much of an opportunity do you see in Western Europe as that landscape continues to shift and other operators sort of look at mitigation measures in that region? Do you see a real opportunity to sort of put the foot down on the gas?
Yeah, I mean Europe is a fragmented market. There are some countries that are very hard to digest and very hard to work in because of regulatory measures and let's say over regulation I would say too much constraints on the product and what we can offer and then there are other markets which are more optimistic and more opened up and these are the markets where we put our efforts. and this is where we put our marketing money. Italy being such one market where we are growing strongly both in casino and sports book.
Mhm. And that's obviously the market where you have the big partnership with Inter into Milan as well which must be a great deal for Betsson to get that exposure in that market. And is that a reflection of maybe the regulatory system in Italy being more favorable than other markets in Western Europe?
Yeah, I wouldn't say that the system in Italy is particularly favorable because it's not easy either, but on the other end of the spectra, there are several markets where it's more or less not feasible to try to do something. And that's a sad part of the Western Europe story.
Mhm. Yeah. Absolutely. It's something that we've covered a lot on this show is that while they are sort of mature markets and there's a lot of appetite for these products, the overregulation is sort of hampering what businesses can do there. Another I want to sort of turn our attention now to two markets where revenues have declined and that's in the Nordics and the Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia regions. They're down 17.1% and 14.9% respectively. Just wanted to ask what you think is causing the downturns in those regions and sort of how you've mitigated for those declines.
If we start with the Nordics then it's just because we don't put the same focus there in terms of marketing investments. We are here we have presence we have quite strong positions in the market but we don't invest much because the return on investment is less good here than what we see from Latin America as an example and the same as SIKA is a different story because there we have a few markets where we do really well but that one is it's more an imbalance between different geographical markets over there.
Sure. Sure. Just on the Nordics you said you just don't invest as heavily in that region as other regions. I think in the report it says it's more on the casino side where the activity has declined. Are you seeing that's because again of sort of the regulatory environment in those countries and sort of channelization rates declining as a result?
16 more exchanges in this transcript
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Lindwall, P. (2026, July 20). Betsson's Record Revenue and Regional Strategies | Ep. 819 [Interview transcript]. SBC Media. CEOInterviews.AI. https://ceointerviews.ai/interview/1114595/
MLA
Pontus Lindwall. "Betsson's Record Revenue and Regional Strategies | Ep. 819." SBC Media, 20 Jul. 2026. Transcript, CEOInterviews.AI, https://ceointerviews.ai/interview/1114595/.
BibTeX
@misc{lindwall2026_1114595,
author = {Pontus Lindwall},
title = {Betsson's Record Revenue and Regional Strategies | Ep. 819},
howpublished = {Interview transcript, SBC Media. CEOInterviews.AI},
year = {2026},
month = {jul},
url = {https://ceointerviews.ai/interview/1114595/},
note = {Speaker-attributed transcript with timestamps}
}
