Evoke revenue falls 7% as UK gambling tax rises weigh on results

Evoke's third-quarter revenue came in at £406m, a 7% drop compared with the same period a year earlier. The figure covers the three months to 30 September 2026 and applies to the group behind William Hill, 888 and Mr Green. Ahead of the autumn budget due the following week, the company urged the UK government not to raise gambling taxes again.

Stripping out the effect of roughly 270 betting shops that shut during the past year, and neutralising currency swings, left a 2% revenue decline. According to Evoke, bettors benefited from favourable football results early in the season, which trimmed growth by one to two percentage points; as a result, underlying revenue was broadly flat.

Per Widerström, the chief executive, said Evoke was concentrating on profit and cash generation after gaming duties, especially in the UK, had risen substantially. He pointed to the 270 shop closures of the past year as evidence of how higher industry taxation affects jobs and livelihoods, and he asked the UK government to weigh carefully any additional increases before the autumn budget.

Those closures came about because of tax measures set out in the UK government's November 2025 budget. On 1 April 2026, remote gaming duty climbed from 21% to 40%. From 1 April 2027, remote betting will be taxed at a new 25% rate, though remote wagers on UK horse racing will stay at 15%.

Once the measures are fully in force, Evoke estimated its yearly duty bill would grow by £125m to £135m. The company aims to counter about half of that extra burden by saving on suppliers, spending less on marketing, shutting shops and cutting operating costs.

Ahead of the budget, Evoke had cautioned that as many as 200 William Hill shops, and no fewer than 120, could be shut, with up to 1,500 jobs in jeopardy. In March the company set out plans to close roughly 200 UK shops for good, about 15% of its retail estate, starting in May. That figure later grew to around 270. Evoke has not said how many roles are at risk, though the closures are expected to cost hundreds of jobs.

The previous week, the heads of Britain's six biggest gambling firms reported that since the 2025 budget more than 600 betting shops had shut and 10,250 online and retail roles had been eliminated or placed at risk of redundancy. They asked the chancellor to keep machine games duty at its current level in the 28 October budget and to hold off on the planned April 2027 betting duty rise until the impact of earlier tax increases could be evaluated.

In December 2025, a few weeks after the tax rises led it to pull its medium-term outlook, Evoke started weighing its options, a sale among them. By June it had reached an all-share agreement with Bally's Intralot giving Evoke investors 0.537 new shares for every share held. That prices Evoke at 52 pence per share, roughly £243.1m in total.

Evoke's most recent update described the Bally's Intralot takeover as proceeding as planned: both companies' shareholders have backed it and the bulk of regulatory clearances are in hand. The transaction is due to close in late fourth-quarter 2026 or early first-quarter 2027. Widerström said Evoke was staying focused on disciplined execution and operational efficiency as the acquisition moves towards completion.

Debt has weighed heavily on the deal. When Evoke bought William Hill's non-US operations from Caesars Entertainment in 2022 for approximately £2bn, it ended 2025 carrying about £1.86bn in debt. To pay for the acquisition and refinance that debt, Bally's Intralot has lined up roughly £889m from TPG Credit, Oaktree and OHA.