Latest online casino news more optimistic for Ladbrokes

The new year has seen two interesting developments in the world of online casino and online sports betting, with Ladbrokes again trying to expand its influence in online gambling. Over recent years Richard Glynn, chief executive of Ladbrokes, has made several attempts to provide his shareholders with good online casino news but talks with online casino rivals 888 Holdings and Sportingbet have so far failed to achieve the required result. Analysts now believe that he may finally be on the verge of a successful takeover, this time the target is Betdaq which is a betting exchange originally set up by Dermot Desmond as a rival to Betfair. Whilst Mr Glynn has not had much success in expanding Ladbrokes through takeovers, he has been able to revive the high street betting shops but Ladbrokes still lag well behind William Hill, Bet365 and Paddy Power in the online casino and online sports gambling market. This deal will not do much to change that scenario, but does offer some opportunities to expand Betdaq into international markets and provide a bigger challenge to Betfair. Also making this month’s online casino news, although more relevant to online sports gambling, is the reported decision by Rank to sell or close their online bookmaker, Blue Square. Apparently this decision is partly due to the new betting tax proposed for offshore online betting, although Blue Square has struggled to compete with their bigger rivals in the online gambling arena and is reported to be losing several million pounds a year. Rank have stated that they want to concentrate on their core businesses, which include the Grosvenor casinos and the Mecca Bingo chain, but they also want to retain an interest in the online casino sector, particularly online casino games such as poker. It’s clear that even a company the size of Ladbrokes is struggling to compete with the likes of William Hill, Bet365 and Paddy Power in the online gambling sector, not helped of course by the takeover of Sportingbet by William Hill after talks with Ladbrokes failed.