As Entain Shares Polish Stumble, Reminds: Many A Slip Between Cup And Lip

Go easy on the Polish vodka shots. Don’t smash your empty glasses down just yet.

For shares in Ladbrokes and Sportingbet owner Entain took a major stumble today (Wednesday), after the FTSE 100 Omnichannel announced it had raised £600 million in a dilution towards funding a proposed £750 million acquisition in Poland — reminding us that there’s many a slip between cup and lip.

The value of Entain shares fell 11 percent to £11.74 in stock market trading on the news, because a significant body of existing Entain investors were unable to partake in the offering, and they feared the financial impact of the dilution on their holdings.

Entain announced their proposed acquisition of STS, Poland’s leading gambling business, on Monday

The deal is being technically handled through their Entain CEE joint venture with Emma Capital, which they set up to power growth in Central and Eastern Europe last August.

Entain owns 75 percent of Entain CEE and has agreed to fund £450 million of the STS purchase price; Emma Capital the rest.

The iGaming giant raised the £600 million by selling 48.29 million new shares through a banking triad of Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley and Banco Santander.

The new shares equate to 8.3 percent of Entain’s share capital before the announcement of their proposed acquisition of STS, which, crucially, is backed by the firm’s CEO Mateusz Juroszek and his father Zbigniew Juroszek, who own 70 percent of the Polish high street bookies and iGamers.

Under the terms of the acquisition, Mateusz Juroszek will stay on as STS chief executive and will also join the Entain CEE Board.