ATG has reported a year-on-year drop of 5% in revenue for the first half of 2025, with a similar drop in revenue generated through its core business, horse racing.
Although established as the largest sports betting company in Sweden, it revealed that net gaming revenue was down by 5% to SEK 2.6 billion ($271 million), with the group’s total revenue of SEK 2.9 billion ($302 million) also showing a 5% downturn.
Net Profit Down By 22%
Net profit over the six months dropped 22% year-on-year, coming in at SEK 650 million ($68 million) with ATG citing tougher tax laws and weaker spending by consumers as the root cause.
Sweden raised its gambling tax from 18% to 22% in July 2024 and ATG estimated in its report that “the higher gambling tax alone increases costs by SEK 105 million ($10.9 million)”.
ATG has built its reputation around responsible gambling on horse racing with profits being reinvested into the sport.
In January 2019 it expanded its markets to include other sports and online casino games.
Looking at net gaming revenues for the individual segments, horse racing was down 5%, posting SEK 1,869 million ($195 million) compared with SEK 1,964 million ($205 million) last year.
There was a more encouraging return from users of the sports betting app with a growth of 3% in sports betting revenue which reached SEK 393 million ($41 million) while its online casino revenue dropped 13% to SEK 304 million ($31.7 million).
Total expenses for the group stood at SEK 2.2 billion ($229 million) which was a 1% increase over last year.
Excluding tax, costs were actually reduced by SEK 47 million ($4.9 million) due to efficiency drives.
The Way Forward For ATG
Looking ahead, ATG said it would continue to invest in product development and the introduction of V85, a new horse racing betting format where bettors could win on eight, seven, six and five correct selections.
The firm also announced in April that it was going to compete in Finland’s regulated online gambling market, in a partnership with Suomen Hippos.
Although horse racing will be its primary focus, sports betting and casino appear as complementary products.
Chief financial officer Lotta Nielsen said: “The way forward is about achieving revenue growth while tightly controlling costs to increase ATG’s results.
“One part of this effort is retaining our large customer base by developing our gaming offerings, and this fall, we have exciting news with V85, the new major horse racing game on Saturdays.”
Jim Munro is a betting industry and gambling expert who has been a national newspaper journalist for over 30 years, predominantly at The Sunday Times and The Sun, where he wrote a weekly soccer betting column. Jim also worked on the launch of Virgin Bet with Gamesys and was subsequently head of editorial at LiveScore, the sports media and betting group.
