DraftKings upwardly revises 2021 revenue guidance in buoyant Q1 financial update

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DraftKings Inc has reported a 253% surge in revenue in its Q1 financial results for the trading period ended March 31, 2021, hitting $312m versus $89m year-on-year.  

After giving pro forma effect to the business combination with SBTech and Diamond Eagle Acquisition Corp, which was completed on April 23, 2020, as if it had occurred on January 1, 2019, revenue grew 175% versus Q1 2020.

Co-founder, CEO and Board Chairman Jason Robins told investors: “DraftKings is off to an outstanding start in 2021. We continued to make progress and remain on track with the migration to our own in-house proprietary sports betting engine, strengthened our content and technology capabilities with the acquisitions of VSiN and BlueRibbon Software, and invested in further differentiating our product offering with the upcoming rollout of social functionality in our DFS and mobile Sportsbook apps.”

CFO Jason Park added: “Our $312m in first quarter revenue, 114% increase in MUPs and 48% growth in average revenue per monthly unique payer (ARPMUP) reflect solid customer acquisition and retention as well as successful launches of mobile sports betting and igaming in new states. We are raising our revenue outlook for 2021 due to the outperformance of our core business in the first quarter and our expectation for continued healthy growth.”

MUPs for DraftKings’ B2C segment increased 114% compared to the first quarter of 2020 with, on average, 1.5 million monthly unique paying customers engaged in Q1. The increase, said the firm, reflects strong unique payer retention and acquisition across daily fantasy sports, online sports betting and igaming.

In line with the upturn in performance, DraftKings also advised that it is raising its fiscal year 2021 revenue guidance from a range of $900m to $1bn to a range of $1.05bn to $1.15bn, equating to year-on-year growth of 63% to 79% and a 16% increase compared to the midpoint of its previous guidance.

Said the firm: “The increase reflects solid performance in the first quarter of 2021, continued strong user activation due to the effectiveness of our marketing spend, well-executed launches of mobile sports betting and igaming in Michigan and mobile sports betting in Virginia, and a modest contribution from our recently completed acquisitions. 

“This guidance also assumes that all professional and college sports calendars that have been announced come to fruition and that we continue to operate in states in which we are live today.