The Australian arm of wagering giant Entain has exceeded head office’s expectations with a surprise doubt-digit growth in net gaming revenue in the first quarter of 2026.
BY BREN O’BRIEN – The Straight – APRIL 16, 2026

Entain’s Australian business has staged a strong turnaround in fortunes with a 12 per cent growth in net gaming revenue across the first three months of 2026, as compared to 2025. After a run of challenging results, the Ladbrokes and Neds brands staged a turnaround, surpassing internal expectations with a double-digit jump. In the same quarter last year, net gaming revenue had dropped eight per cent.

While “customer-friendly sports results” were attributed to the decline in Q1 last year, a change in customer approach, prompted by a greater compliance focus, has also played a part in Entain’s Australian challenges. It cut its workforce by 10 per cent late last year, while it exited from initiatives such as the Ladbrokes Racing Club as well as a host of sponsorship agreements.

Having reset the strategy of the business – what new Australia and New Zealand CEO Andrew Vouris calls “winning but not at any cost” – it appears to have gone through the worst of the slump. On top of that, punter results have started going the way of big bookmakers again. The Straight reported that last Saturday was the best day, in terms of margins, for the Entain bookmakers in Australia in at least five years.

The Australian result was front and centre of Entain’s global results released on Thursday, which, along with a 13 per cent growth in NGR in the UK and Ireland, helped online NGR increase by 5 per cent across the group.

“We entered 2026 with strong momentum, which has continued in Q1, with strong volume growth across our diversified portfolio,” Stella David, chief executive of Entain, commented. “This further demonstrates our ongoing strategic execution and strengthening operations, and also highlights the growth embedded in our globally scaled business.”

FY26 guidance globally remains unchanged, with online NGR growth of five to seven per cent. “Entain remains comfortable with market expectations for FY26 Group Underlying EBITDA and reiterates its confidence in generating at least £500m of annual adjusted cashflow in 2028,” it said.

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Welcome to the Entain Edition for April 2026

The world of wagering has undergone major changes in the last 30 to 40 years. The advent of the internet, round-the-clock broadcasting and the ability to place a bet from a phone in your pocket means customer behaviour has changed drastically in that time.

In previous missives of Entain Edition, we have touched on the huge growth of fixed odds betting on racing compared to betting on the tote, and that has a flow-on effect to how success is defined within the racing industry.

Turnover used to be the pure measure for racing clubs and the codes, but that was in a world where take-out rates from the various tote pools were fixed at a certain percentage. Tote betting is essentially customers betting against each other, whereas in fixed odds, it’s very much more a case of punter and bookie doing battle.

That means there are a few other factors that need to be considered when digesting the By The Numbers graphic which features at the bottom of this newsletter. We include the overall field sizes for each racing code for that very reason – if the equine codes can average 10-14 runners a race, that’s the sweet spot for everyone (bookie, code and customer).

More than that though, how the punt goes on the day for our customers has an effect on turnover. If a string of well-backed favourites salute the judge at a meeting, chances are turnover will be up on a year-on-year basis as our customers take the opportunity to invest their winnings.

But that also works the other way – if it’s a tough day for the punters, you may see turnover drop, but the actual revenue from the day would ultimately be a good result for the industry because of the high margins.

If the results end up about even over the year in terms of “punters’ days” versus “bookies’ days”, that’s where we would love to land, but that doesn’t always happen, thanks to the glorious uncertainty of racing.

I trust this provides a little more context to the figures you see each month.

Please share or forward this newsletter to anyone in the industry who you think might like to read this. They can sign up to receive the Entain Edition directly by contacting communications@entaingroup.co.nz. If you no longer wish to receive this newsletter, please contact the same address.

Sam Moncur
Managing Director – New Zealand
Entain Australia and New Zealand

John says “The Entain NZ Turnover figures for April have bucked an upward trend for the last two years or so, showing a decline in T/O for the month of 7.7% on Thoroughbreds, although interestingly, there were 121,000 “actives” (meaning people having a bet) compared to 109,000 in March 2025, an increase of 11% year on year and Sports Betting for the month showed a 50% increase year on year – I am only speculating, but a more vibrant Pacific Super Rugby comp this year and a strong start to the season by the NZ Warriors may have been factors here

Readers should also take note of Sam Moncur’s comments about lower turnover not necessarily meaning lower revenue for the TAB, particularly from Fixed Odds Betting. TAB profitability will increasingly become of vital interest to us all as we draw closer and closer to the end of the 5 year “guarantee” from Entain” and the quantum of funding for the codes becomes very dependent on TAB profitability

John also says “As we know bookmaking has always been regarded as somewhat of a dark art – back in the day, when I was still only aged 19, I was living and working in the town of Kalgoorlie in Western Australia and I got to know a guy who was a “penciler” for the local bookie – the “penciler” was the Clerk who would sit behind the bookie on his stand at racedays and it was his job to jot down a record of all of the bets and relay vital information to the bookie about the bets being taken, so that the bookie could “balance his book” making sure that he had his pricing right – for a young guy from NZ, where bookies had been outlawed for 50 years or so previously and we only had tote betting, this was very fascinating and it was very exciting to go to the races and observe the “bookies ring” in action. Things have changed of course and the pencilers have been discarded to the dustbins of history, being long replaced by algorithms and more recently AI, and the article below from Entain provides some interesting insight to how the modern “bookie” operates in this day and age”

Welcome  to the Bookie Breakdown. 

This week, we’re focusing on the Night of Champions. For those new to the column, this is where I pull back the curtain on how we price and trade our New Zealand harness markets, the decisions we got right, the ones we got wrong, and the reasoning behind both.
What a night of racing to write about. The best against the best and it delivered. Here’s our take on the key races.

This was an interesting race to price. You had to quantify the very public wrap trainer/driver Tony Herlihy and his camp have on the filly Our Col, alongside the profile and body of work of Kyvalley Ray.
We opened Our Col as the $2.30 favourite, and Kyvalley Ray at $2.90, with the draws being the main factor in that decision. The market saw it completely differently. Kyvalley Ray was heavily backed days out, and it was clear early that the market was going to flip.
Kyvalley Ray ended up holding 59% of the Fixed Odds win investment, suggesting the market had her closer to a $1.60 to $1.70 chance, making our closing price of $2.15 still a touch big. Our Col’s passing lane victory was a great result for us, holding just 27%.
One to watch: Kairo held more investment than Tattica despite starting at a bigger price and may be one to keep an eye on next start in a more suitable race.

It’s safe to say we got this one wrong. We have really struggled over the past year and a half to price this crop of 3-year-old fillies, and that continued on Friday night.
When we framed this market, we thought there were a few ways the race could play out. The customers saw one way, and one only. Smackdown was heavily supported early in trading – the $11 opening price was value and the $7.50 closing price on money invested alone was bang on.
We opened Ripples at $2.90 with question marks around the uncertain race map drawing 1 the second line, which in hindsight was much too generous. Even the $2.20 on the close was too big, holding 53% of fixed win bets. In a race where we had little confidence, we needed to trade more aggressively and should have been selling less than $2 on the jump.
The lead/trail scenario played out exactly as the market anticipated, and the two best backed runners ran first and second.

The Garrard’s Sires Stakes 3-year-old colts and gelding semifinal was a great example of a race where most punters would assume we cleaned up, but we didn’t.
Allamericanplayer was very well found in this market, priced and traded well, holding around 48% of money invested, which is perfect for a horse at that price point of $2.10. Where we came unstuck was not respecting the money for Lincoln Wave.
We penalised him heavily from his wide draw and his big starting prices in previous three-year-old races. The mistake there was that Jumal was in those fields, which explains the inflated starting prices, so opening the Ray Green and Nathan Delany-trained runner at $101 was unnecessary.
With Lincoln Wave holding 1.5% of the book, we should have been trading him at $51 to $41, not $91, which would have limited the damage. A losing result on the win book, but when you account for multis and the Box Seat Boost on Allamericanplayer, which held $20k, we came out in front for the race.
Some lessons for us in this race regardless.

These types of races with an extremely hot favourite are largely non-events for us in terms of win market pricing, as they almost price themselves. Keayang Zahara was $1.05 all day long – my nana could have priced her, and she calls harness racing ‘chariot racing’.
Where the difficulty comes is in the Extras markets we open around these races. They are complex and do not always directly reflect the win market.
The two markets that saw the most action were the market with Keayang Zahara removed, and the first NZ horse home. We got one right and one wrong. We had mapped Jilliby Ballerini to get a good trip and had her as firm favourite in the Zahara out market against Gus, who we knew would have to do plenty of work.
Meant To Be at $7.50 to be first Kiwi home was, in hindsight, blatantly wrong and was found by a few astute judges.
Overall, though, Keayang Zahara was a great result in our win book, holding just 60% of single win bets. Meant To Be was our worst result, closely followed by Gus.

Plenty of opinions out there on the market for The Race by Sport Nation, and that is what racing is all about.
With this race being Australian dominant, there were a few external factors that helped shape our closing market. Early doors, there was plenty of chatter around the speed map, and personally I think this is one of the weaknesses in NZ harness markets. Once the market settles on one likely scenario, it shapes the majority of early betting.
We sold a very large proportion of our early bets on Swayzee and Captains Knock, with customers playing the anticipated lead/trail situation. We opened Swayzee at $4.20 and were more than happy selling bets there, sitting at $4 for as long as we physically could before external factors caused us to close shorter at $3.20.
Leap To Fame, with his high profile, was the best backed runner in the race and was our worst result. The Janitor was a drifter in the market, but we knew that would be the case and were comfortable putting ourselves in that position. Merlin was the best backed Kiwi by a margin.
I’m happy with how we handled this race from a pricing and trading perspective. It is very easy to listen to the outside noise and reshape your market. We did not on this occasion.

This feature meeting was a night where we just came out in front across the 10-race card. Ripples was our worst result on the night, with our best results coming on the undercard, including Bettor Reaction, Leo Lincoln and, surprisingly, Francent.

Hope you all enjoyed the racing and the extra betting options we had on offer. Back a couple winners but not too many.

Greetings John and Friday Flash readers

Not many of us this year  – irrespective of location –  have escaped the harsh elements and Wellingtonians copped its  share of the atrocious stuff earlier in the week.Some of us based in the Capital got through the sudden downfalls with just  a general outdoor tidy up but many  others weren’t so lucky and we certainly feel for them. Mother nature often throws a few unexpected curve balls at times doesn’t she?

Onwards and upwards to a very pleasant distraction from unwelcome storms to a  most exciting weekend of sport and racing. It’s  a well documented super rugby bonanza at the new Christchurch stadium; a sold out Warriors game at the Wellington Cake Tin and black type racing at Riccarton and Te Rapa and across the Tasman. Then of course on Sunday night in Hong Kong the two best horses in the world, Romantic Warrior and Ka Ying Rising are in action again.   But above all this, of course, it’s Anzac Weekend. A special time for reflection. Lest we forget!!

WHERE HAVE ALL THE CENTRAL DISTRICTS TWO YEAR OLDS GONE?

HAS two year old racing reached a road block at this time of the year in the CD?
It certainly appears this way when you consider the Otaki two year old race today was abandoned because of insufficient entries. This follows on from the Wanganui meeting last Saturday when only 4 ran including one from the north while a week earlier the two year old race at Otaki had 7 runners with just 3 from the CD.

Despite the lack of interest the governing body has injected another $5k into the two year old race at Woodville next Wednesday with it now worth $22k. Does this makes sense? Could the $5k be of better use as say a transport additional subsidy?

The CD still has two prominent two year old races to go this season, the Castletown Stakes around the 3rd week of June and the Ryder Stakes in the last week of July. Some 24 two year olds trained in the Taranaki, Wanganui and Manawatu regions competed in trials at Foxton recently. Maybe these late developers might make a late play to repel the northern dominance as we close in on both the Castletown and the Ryder. With 13 accepting for the two year old event at Te Rapa on Saturday things look far more rosier in the north.

If both these races important black type two year old races coming up don’t have a decent input from the CD this year maybe it’s time to give them another place on the calendar.

THE RYDER STAKES TRUMPS THE CASTLETOWN STAKES 

SOME  great CD trained two year olds have won both these races over the years. Since 1970 the Levin Racing Club Ryder Stakes has provided the last opportunity for NZ‘s late maturing two year olds and with a penchant for the expected wet ground to win a prized black type event. Gordon Ryder, an ex club president and a breeder, had a vision to programme a race at the end of the season as a gateway to the spring classics.

The roll of honour certainly kept pace to his vision when you consider the big race three year olds like Altitude,  Beechcraft, Arctic Wolf, Weston Lea, Veandercross and Egyptian Raine all have their names on the Levin trophy. All are subsequent group one winners; multiple time for a few in fact!

The Castletown Stakes, which is run at the end of June, doesn’t boast a historic record anything like the Levin race. I cannot see a winner from the last 15 years in the Castletown that managed a group one outside Volpe Veloce who won the 2018 Railway after the 2016 Castletown.

The bottom line is that both races need protecting and maybe the best way to do it is to shift either of them or both out of the winter and into a season more in line with better CD numbers. It’ll certainly be interesting to see how many CD two year olds will be around for both upcoming races.

THE 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF QUEEN OF THE SOUTH

LAST week we reflected on the amazing Grey Way as it was one year short of the 50th anniversary of arguably his greatest of his 51 wins, the Easter Handicap at Ellerslie.

The 50th anniversary of one of the greatest racemares of her era, Show Gate, coincides with the 1976 Canterbury Gold Cup which is run at Riccarton on Saturday. She in fact won the race  twice, in 1976 and two years prior in 1974. And the four horses that ran second and third to her in the Canterbury Gold Cups were Sobeit, Guest Star, Silver Lad  and Mayo Mellay! If you are a baby boomer like me and have been involved with racing ever since you could walk you’ll agree that those also rans weren’t too shabby!)

On Saturday it’s also the Great Easter and, yes, Show Gate won that too, three years earlier. That she was a prolific winner, like her southern buddy Grey Way, is without fear of contradiction. Between them, in the 1970’s era, they won 81 times!!

In my humble opinion her greatest win was her last, the 1977 Trentham Stakes. Bob Skelton, who held so much devotion for the horse they dubbed the “Queen of the South” felt her slightly stumble inside the last 200m but her will to win didn’t get the better of her as she wore down the excellent front runner, Varnarmo. She had fractured her sesamoid bone ( for the second time) and the massive crowd went from cheering en masse to deadly silence as Bob Skelton led her back into the birdcage. Click HERE to see footage of the 1977 Trentham Stakes
And click HERE to see her full story from the Racing Hall Of Fame

Show Gate was truly a marvel.

10 FACTS ABOUT SHOW GATE

1. She won races from 1200m to 2400m and was unlucky not to win the Wellington Cup (3200m) when second to Good Lord in 1977 after her jockey rode without a whip from the top of the straight.
2. She was bred, owned and trained by Gordon Thomson, a chicken sexer.
3. Not only did a fractured sesamoid end her career at Trentham  she was patched up after a similar injury in the spring of 1974 after winning her first 5 races as a five year old.
4. When she won the Trentham Stakes on “ three legs” she broke the NZ record over 2400m of 2.26.1.
5. She was NZ Horse of the Year in 1975 and 1977
6. She was inducted into the NZ Racing Hall of Fame in 2012
7. Over the NZ Cup Carnival she won the three main black type races in 7 days; the Stewards (1200m); the Canterbury Gold Cup (2000m) and the Churchill Stakes ( 1600m).
8. She had one Australian race, the Theo Marks in September 1976 and was unplaced
9. Show Gate produced three foals; two were colts by Honey Crepe, Sporting Show and Every Show. Between them they won 21 races. Her filly Show Queen was by Balmerino who became the dam of Showella who Frank Ritchie trained to win the group one NZ Stakes ( Zabeel Classic) in 2000 and the group one 1999 South Australian Derby.
10 Show Gate died at Prebbleton Farm in Canterbury in 1977 with spleen cancer.

LAST SATURDAY IMPROVERS

GRANDE GALLO: likes Ellerslie and the run on Saturday was that of a definite improver as attacked the line over 1200m to record the last 400 and 200.

HAPPY YOUMZAIN : she copped a check start from the wide draw and she did very well to finish a close 4th with the fastest last 800 and 400. She might start on Monday at Ellerslie.

HANKEE ALPHA: her run in the last was enormous. Had she made her run earlier she wins! She was asked to do too much from the tricky draw but stormed home with far and away the quickest sectionals.

Good punting!

Des Coppins
021 448 052

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