Ladbrokes warns of ‘disappointing’ online results

Ladbrokes has issued its second profit warning this year following a “disappointing” performance at its online betting business.

Joseph O'Brien riding Leading Light win The Ladbrokes St Leger at Doncaster. Picture: Getty

The bookmaker, which has more than 2,800 shops across Europe, warned profits from its digital division will miss City forecasts because of a “lack of competitiveness” and lower-than-expected margins.

The group expects its online arm to deliver an operating profit of between £10 million and £14m for 2013, compared with analysts’ predictions of about £28m.

Shares tumbled 7.6 per cent to 173.88p after the latest downbeat update from the chain, which last month revealed its half-year profits had almost halved to £55.1m.

Canaccord Genuity analyst Simon Davies said: “This is another deeply disappointing update from Ladbrokes, putting considerable pressure on the chief executive, Richard Glynn.”

Chairman Peter Erskine said: “While we are disappointed that the digital results are still not where we anticipated they would be, the board believes that the strategy is the right one.”