Churchill Downs Acquires Youbet

[andymays]

CDI 'Well-Positioned' to Make Other Deals | BloodHorse.com

http://www.bloodhorse.com/horse-raci...ke-other-deals

Excerpt:

Churchill Downs Inc., which announced Nov. 11 plans to purchase Youbet.com and its United Tote subsidiary for about $126.8 million, is on the lookout for other prospective purchases in the area of Internet wagering.
During a Nov. 12 conference call on which the Youbet.com deal was discussed, CDI president and chief executive officer Robert Evans said the mix of equity and cash that will be used for the purchase is designed for the future. He said CDI can “preserve its balance sheet” for future deals.
“We’re well-positioned to pursue other online business opportunities as they develop,” Evans said.

Excerpt:

Evans did say the tote component is an attractive aspect of the Youbet.com deal. The National Thoroughbred Racing Association, through its Safety and Integrity Alliance, will branch out into wagering security and integrity next year, and tote protocol will be part of that process.

Evans said United Tote is a “stable, established system,” though concerns about the “financial viability and stability of tote system providers and the need to improve the integrity of tote system wagering are well-established.” He said CDI can use United Tote to “directly address those problems” and “improve tote system stability, performance, and integrity.”
Also during the Nov. 12 conference call, Evans and other CDI officials said it’s too soon to say what the combined TwinSpires.com and Youbet.com platforms will look like or even be named.
“We are limited as this time to discuss the future,” Evan said.

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Churchill out to dominate account-wagering

By Matt Hegarty

http://www.drf.com/news/article/108881.html

Excerpt:

Churchill Downs Inc. is poised to become the most dominant account-wagering operator in the United States if a planned merger with Youbet.com is approved by regulators and the two companies' shareholders.
The merger, announced on Wednesday evening and discussed by officials of both companies in conference calls on Thursday morning, will create an account-wagering business that would have had combined handle of $679 million in 2008, when Churchill's account-wagering operation, Twinspires.com, handled $241 million and Youbet.com took in $483 million. The current market leader, Television Games Network, handled $503 million in customer bets in 2008.

[Indulto]

Originally Posted by rrbauer

See! This player DOES have some good ideas.

Thanks for the kind words, rrb.

Are we talking yet?

[grimm7]

If I go to the racetrack and Churchill is not on the menu they are not giving me a choice to buy it.

[trigger]

Originally Posted by Indulto

We have to help ourselves.

Stop betting until a Horesplayer's Bill of Rights is agreed to by the industry and a referendum of unique individual CUSTOMERS on-track and off who would be registered ADW account holders and/or track reward program participants.

IMO the least that might happen is that tired and injured racehorses will have an opportunity to recover.

The most that might happen is that enough players would look up from their Racing Forms and talk with each other about what would make their pasttime better for them, and establish a true collective influence representing all their interests to the same extent.

Indulto., I am tired of the whining by all the bigtime (and smalltime) bettors on this board about the state of ADW betting.
Puleeeze stop the BS and form your own ADW. All you need is a couple of programmers and some money which based on all the winners on this MB should be no problem for you guys/gals to get together to provide the funds necessary to set up one the best horseplayer friendly ADW's.
I'll gladly sign up when you guys do but, in the meantime, chill. Trigger

[Indulto]

Originally Posted by trigger

Indulto., I am tired of the whining by all the bigtime (and smalltime) bettors on this board about the state of ADW betting.
Puleeeze stop the BS and form your own ADW. All you need is a couple of programmers and some money which based on all the winners on this MB should be no problem for you guys/gals to get together to provide the funds necessary to set up one the best horseplayer friendly ADW's.
I'll gladly sign up when you guys do but, in the meantime, chill. Trigger

Herr Trigger,
Nice to see you're so satisfied with the status quo, and that some zero is diddling while racing burns.

Actually, several people already suggested that HANA start its own ADW. Maybe they haven't because they're afraid you'd stalk them the way you did PTC.

[rrbauer]

Originally Posted by trigger

Indulto., I am tired of the whining by all the bigtime (and smalltime) bettors on this board about the state of ADW betting.
Puleeeze stop the BS and form your own ADW. All you need is a couple of programmers and some money which based on all the winners on this MB should be no problem for you guys/gals to get together to provide the funds necessary to set up one the best horseplayer friendly ADW's.
I'll gladly sign up when you guys do but, in the meantime, chill. Trigger

True statement. Ask Bernie Madoff.

In two years there will be no independent ADW's. The monopoly mentalities will have restricted them to the point where their margins will have been crushed by tracks and horse owner's groups kowtowing to the NTRA backed industry power structure.

I was told by a former tote-company exec today, that in three years, racing in Calif will be half of what it is today. The good news is that if that results in half the days being allocated to racing associations as are allocated today, that there will be a better match between races available and horses available to race in them. The bad news is that if that results in the same number of days being allocated to racing associations as are allocated today then the average field size will be about 4.

Does everyone understand that the ONLY THING that will level the playing field for horseplayers is an out-and-out boycott. Withholding your money from the game period. No money for your favorite track. No money for your favorite ADW. No money PERIOD. Every institution in the industry has to be put between a rock and a hard place. Economic hurt has to be inflicted across the board. There couldn't be a better time to do it than now.

What say you?

[cj]

The closer we get to a monopoly of tracks owning ADWs the worse it gets for bettors. Even sadder, the worse it gets for the sport because we have all seen tracks are horrible running the business.

[Tom]

The upside is maybe a bunch of them will fold up. That would be a good thing.
Let them withhold their signals from everyone and dry up. No way in Hell will ever patronize anything CD is involved in.

[Indulto]

Originally Posted by rrbauer

True statement. Ask Bernie Madoff.

In two years there will be no independent ADW's. The monopoly mentalities will have restricted them to the point where their margins will have been crushed by tracks and horse owner's groups kowtowing to the NTRA backed industry power structure.

I was told by a former tote-company exec today, that in three years, racing in Calif will be half of what it is today. The good news is that if that results in half the days being allocated to racing associations as are allocated today, that there will be a better match between races available and horses available to race in them. The bad news is that if that results in the same number of days being allocated to racing associations as are allocated today then the average field size will be about 4.

Does everyone understand that the ONLY THING that will level the playing field for horseplayers is an out-and-out boycott. Withholding your money from the game period. No money for your favorite track. No money for your favorite ADW. No money PERIOD. Every institution in the industry has to be put between a rock and a hard place. Economic hurt has to be inflicted across the board. There couldn't be a better time to do it than now.

What say you?

Amen.

[cj]

Originally Posted by Indulto

Amen.

Ditto. The game is getting harder and harder to beat with shrinking fields and rising takeouts. Actually, forget about "beat", but even to stay afloat.

[the_fat_man]

Originally Posted by cj

Ditto. The game is getting harder and harder to beat with shrinking fields and rising takeouts. Actually, forget about "beat", but even to stay afloat.

Going to be particularly hard once WO closes for the winter.

[lamboguy]

ubet was the biggest adw. churhill is now going to have a monopoly over the game. forget what will happen to the players, they will now control over 50% of all bets going to everywhere in north america, between them twinspires and express bet or whatever express bet is. they can now dictate how much they want to pay for a signal to small tracks. they probably can dictate what they want to pay NYRA. this deal has not been aproved yet by the regulartory commission yet. it probably will though even though there are plenty of challenging issues involved.

[HUSKER55]

has anybody called up the regulatory committee and complained or got a response, opinion or anything?

besides what has been posted. These are copies of articles or did I miss read something.

[DJofSD]

Churchill Downs is making us an offer we can not refuse.

What do you do when you have some one like Vito Corleone taking over? Oh ya -- you put something horribly gross in their bed while they are asleep.

[CBedo]

Interestingly, the fact that YouBet accepted such a low price might say something about their forecast of the racing future. I thnk the premium was just over 25% if you look at the day before's closing price, but that is also about a 25% discount to where the stock was this summer.

They also announced on the 11th that although ADW revenues were up year over year for the 9 months, they were actually down 4% for the quarter.