About this app
What is Starlight?
Numbers have remained steady a year on, and in H1 this year, various markets were hailed as core growth drivers for the business, including Australia, New Zealand, Spain and the UK.
Meanwhile, cost-saving efforts have seen retail shops and operational roles cut this year. And the group has chosen to exit its CEE business and sell off a significant share.
In August newly appointed CFO Michael Snape said the move was expected to de-lever, unlock and return capital to shareholders.
How to play Starlight
According to Multiples.VC, the average enterprise multiple (EV/EBITDA) of top US-listed gaming companies is currently 10x. Data from New York University last updated in January pegged the overall market average at 23.9x and 19.7x among EBITDA-positive firms, suggesting the sector is undervalued relative to other industries. In a report released Monday, Fitch Ratings said most North American gaming companies hold “Stable” outlooks with “adequate rating headroom” despite consumer headwinds.
Macquarie’s Beynon agrees with that sentiment, pointing to the relative stability of gaming companies through tough economic stretches such as the Covid-19 pandemic. Bankruptcies in the sector have been low relative to the broader market, he notes, and both land-based and digital companies have reason for optimism moving forward.
“It’s certainly not lost on us that this sector has underperformed for several years in a row just because it doesn’t have either the growth of say, tech companies, or the perceived free cash flow-insulated businesses, which we believe it does…We’ve thought there’s been value in the sector for a few years, particularly this year,” he told iGB.
About Starlight
The design decision matters more than the garden-war premise. Coins can award an Instant Bonus, open Hold & Spin, or launch one of the wheel-driven Bonus Spins modes. That gives the whole feature set one consistent trigger.
That consolidation is the news hook. Rather than spreading activation across scatters, dedicated bonus symbols, and separate triggers, Play’n GO has made one symbol responsible for every route into a feature.
Everything runs through Coins. The Coin connects the four Instant Bonus tiers, Hold & Spin, and the two wheel-driven Bonus Spins modes, giving a busy feature set a single point of entry.
