Irish bookmakers might struggle during collapse

[The Buzz]

The struggling economy has taken its toll all around the world. The government of Iceland collapsed within the last few months and many say Ireland is well on its way to collapse as well.

One of the most popular bookmakers in the world, Paddy Power, is headquartered in Ireland and may be hit especially hard, considering gambling isn't considered recession proof anymore.

From Gambling911:

A product of Ireland's thriving economy has been the bookmaking business, for which Paddy Power is not just the largest bookmaker in Ireland but the third largest in the United Kingdom after Ladbrokes and William Hill.

Gambling is no longer considered a "recession proof" industry as Las Vegas has already shown.

Paddy Power was scheduled to report earnings on Monday. The shares have fallen 51 cents, or 4.4 percent, to 11 euros. Still the bookmaker was hopeful of keeping on track for underlying profits of €75m. Likewise, Paddy Power is one of the few groups expected to deliver a yield of 5.1 per cent in 2009, according to Goodbody projections. They are one of the few shining stars in Ireland's economy, a star that might not stay lit for much longer.

[Betpartners]

ok dont see it happening

first paadypower is not third largest bookie in the UK, corals is then the tote, so dont know where they get that bit from.

Also Iceland is not EU so lacked that essential support network, Ireland wont go bankrupt as a country because of this and the amount of money the UK has invested within Ireland

Ireland is safe and if any EU country was to go bankrupt it would be Hungary and even them i cannot see, the EU would simply collapse as an entity if one of its members went bankrupt and then protectionism would kick in big time.

Not sure where this article gets its info from but it looks seriously flawed to me.

[Betpartners]

Just to put it into more perspective Paddypower has 60 UK Shops

Corals has 1600
Tote has 540
Betfred 750

And there are more

[universal4]

Well it was published at 911 so that answers part of that one....

Rick
Universal4

[Fintan]

For those interested are statements where released yesterday and can be downloaded from here:

http://paddypowerplc.com/

"We have grown earnings per share by 10% despite the challenging environment. Our online opertations performed particularly strongly with a 48% increase in operating profit in constant currency."

Also to clarify we are the 3rd largest "online" bookmaker in the UK

[Betpartners]

For those interested are statements where released yesterday and can be downloaded from here:

http://paddypowerplc.com/

"We have grown earnings per share by 10% despite the challenging environment. Our online opertations performed particularly strongly with a 48% increase in operating profit in constant currency."

Also to clarify we are the 3rd largest "online" bookmaker in the UK

Wont argue with that, my relations are too good with paddypower to spoil