TAB New Zealand (TAB NZ) provides the sixth monthly trading update for the 2021/2022 financial year, with the results and highlights for January 2022.
The TAB was able to continue to operate successfully through its online and available retail channels throughout January. With the majority of New Zealand in the Orange setting of the Covid-19 Protection Framework/Traffic Light System through most of January, traditional holiday racing clubs welcomed crowds back on course. High quality racing through the month led to a strong month of turnover compared to January 2021. The Karaka Million meeting continued its rise as a leading meeting on the calendar, with $5.5 million turnover on the six-race card.
With all of New Zealand moving to Red in the Traffic Light System at 11.59pm on Sunday 23 January, this had an effect on on-course attendance and therefore on-course turnover. Notwithstanding this, the turnover result for January was comfortably up on budget, rounding out a solid six months of trading.
The TAB NZ Board has been able to maintain betting profit distributions at budgeted levels through the year to date. With funding from Betting Information Use Charges and the Betting Levy tracking above budget, this has meant that total distributions have been above budgeted expectations. As New Zealand enters new phases in its response to the Omicron variant of the Covid-19 virus, the Board will maintain a close watch on potential developments, any potential flow-on effect on trading conditions and any effect on profit distributions.
Wagering Performance Summary
In January, the key performance results for TAB continued to trend positively off the back of a strong December. Subject to final audit, turnover of $241.3m was 7.2% ($16.3m) up on budget and gross betting revenue (GBR) of $40.0m was 11% up on budget, at a gross betting margin (GBM) of 16.6%.
Racing
Average NZ thoroughbred starters per race was 10.8, matching the Year To Date (YTD) average of 10.7, while the peak turnover for a domestic meeting was $6.10m on 1 January for the New Year’s Day Races at Ellerslie. Harness average starters per race was 11.0, above the YTD average of 10.3, while the peak meeting turnover of $1.55m was on 2 January for the New Year's Meeting at Omakau Racecourse.
For greyhound racing, the average starters per race was 7.6, matching the YTD average, while the peak turnover for a domestic meeting was $435k on 20 January at Addington.
The total margin for the month across all New Zealand racing was 19.5%,, above the YTD domestic racing margin of 18.5%. Overseas racing margin was 19.4%, above the YTD average of 18.4%.
Sport
Australian Open tennis led the sporting events in January with turnover of $6.4m across the entire tournament. The total margin on in-play sport throughout January was 6.5%. Basketball and tennis dominated in-play performance, accounting for 61% of in-play turnover at 7.1% and 4.4% margin respectively. The pre-match singles margin was 11.%, driven by basketball (32% of pre-match sports turnover) at a margin of 14.6% and cricket (23% of pre-match sports turnover) at 8.1%. Sports Multi margin was 26.0%.
January Operational Performance
- Reported Profit for the month was $17.8m, which was $2.1m above Budget.
- Operating Expenses were $9.9m for the month, which was $0.2m below Budget.
- Year To Date (1 Aug 2021 to 31 Jan 2022) Reported Profit* was $85.6m, which was $2.1m above Budget and $12.4m below last year.
- Year To Date (1 Aug 2021 to 31 Jan 2022) Operating Expenses* were $57.5m, which was $2.4m below Budget and $2.5m above last year.
* - Note: Year to date figures are subject to final audit.
December Distributions
Racing codes were paid $17.4m in distributions and other payments for January, versus $16.7m budgeted. This consisted of TAB NZ Betting Profit (listed as Fixed Distribution in the table below), offshore bookmaker commission fees, which are based on actual turnover (termed Betting Information Use Charges (BIUC) in the table below), and Betting Duty/Levy repeal.
Top 10 Racing events by turnover
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Top 10 Sporting events by turnover
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