Bally’s Intralot Posts €544m H1 as UK Tax Doubles and Evoke Shareholders Vote Yes

Key Points

• The BII unit of Bally’s Intralot was responsible for €544.2 million in group revenues during H1 2026, as the net gaming revenues of the UK reached their peak level even after the imposition of 40% remote gaming duties by Britain effective from 1 April.
• The UK tax hike cost the company €34 million in the quarter, causing the Q2 adjusted EBITDA to fall to €84.6 million from €100.2 million during Q1 despite growth in the group revenues by 3% quarter-on-quarter to €276.1 million.
• The Evoke stockholders approved 99.63% the acquisition of Bally’s Intralot valued at £243.1 million through an all-share deal on 17 August.

What does it look like when a company breaks a revenue record and takes a €34 million earnings hit in the same quarter? For Bally’s Intralot, it looks like the first half of 2026. On the morning of 17 August, the Athens-listed group published results showing €544.2 million in H1 revenue and an all-time high in UK net gaming revenue — and then watched Evoke shareholders approve its £243.1 million takeover bid by 99.63% before the day was out. Two separate stories, one company, one very telling set of numbers.

Record Revenue, But the UK Tax Bill Arrived

The BII unit brought in a contribution of €377.6 million from the company’s total €544.2 million H1 revenues, representing the first six months since the BII business unit became part of the company after its acquisition in October 2025 worth €2.7 billion. The adjusted EBITDA for the company for the half-year stood at €184.8 million, while the BII alone contributed €132.8 million of that.

There was an all-time peak recorded in the net gaming revenue for the UK in Q2, which recorded growth in the region of 11.6% compared to the same period in the previous year. There was even more growth from Spain in terms of the quarter as the revenue there grew by 9.7%. However, both numbers represent very good performance. But not for long because on 1 April 2026, everything changed. This is the day when the remote gaming duty in the UK increased from 21% to 40%.

The effect was immediate: €34 million was directly stripped from the company’s Q2 adjusted EBITDA. Around 65% of this negative impact was recouped by Bally’s Intralot via revenue increases and operational efficiency improvements with revenue accounting for €10.1 million and cost-cutting for €11.3 million. This left €84.6 million of negative EBITDA for Q2 after €100.2 million was recorded in Q1 despite the increase in quarterly group revenue by 3% to €276.1 million. Both figures tell a story about how the company increased top-line revenues but managed to lose some ground on the EBITDA front simply due to taxes.

The UK’s remote gaming duty increase was announced in the Autumn 2024 budget and was projected to raise £4 billion in tax receipts in 2025-26 alone. The government expected operators to pass up to 90% of the burden to consumers. Bally’s Intralot’s results suggest the reality is more complex: the group grew player volumes and UK revenue to record levels while absorbing a significant share of the cost internally, rather than passing all of it through.

Legacy Intralot Business Slides as US Lottery Softens

Unlike the BII narrative, the Legacy Intralot business went in the opposite direction. Revenues stood at €166.5 million in H1 compared to €182 million in the same quarter in the prior year, and the legacy adjusted EBITDA was 13.6% lower at €52.1 million. The B2B business line brought €128.1 million of revenue, a 10.1% decrease compared to the same quarter last year. The United States, being the largest market in that particular business line, was the reason for the decline. Its revenue was 11.7% down on a constant currency basis due to softer lotteries and equipment sales in H1 2025.

The B2C legacy business, which includes Turkey’s Bilyoner betting platform, slipped to €38.5 million from €39.5 million a year earlier. Bilyoner’s Q2 revenue fell 21.8% quarter-on-quarter in euro terms, even though total betting volumes in Turkey grew 28.9% in local currency. That gap reveals a structural issue rather than a trading one: a remuneration structure change and the depreciation of the Turkish lira against the euro continued to depress reported figures regardless of underlying market activity.

The group closed H1 with adjusted net debt of €1.62 billion and an adjusted net leverage ratio of 4.05x on a pro forma basis. Management described the ratio as “temporarily elevated,” pointing directly to an €85 million capital expenditure payment linked to a 15-year electronic gaming machine monitoring licence in Victoria, Australia, which the company secured in April 2026. Strip that one-off out, and the leverage picture looks materially different. On a pro forma basis for the twelve months ending 30 June 2026, the combined group generated €1.06 billion in revenue and €399.9 million in adjusted EBITDA.

Evoke Shareholders Deliver a 99.63% Yes

While the results landed in the morning, the bigger news came from the shareholder meeting running in parallel. On 17 August, Evoke shareholders voted 99.63% in favour of the special resolution approving Bally’s Intralot’s £243.1 million all-share acquisition at the company’s general meeting. At the court meeting held the same day, 99.91% of scheme shares backed the transaction, with 268.2 million votes cast in favour and just 236,504 against.

These are not close calls. They are the kind of margins that signal broad institutional confidence in the rationale, not reluctant acceptance of a limited alternative. And the backdrop against which they voted was not comfortable: Evoke entered the meeting carrying approximately £1.8 billion in borrowings, including £769 million of debt maturing in July 2028. Its board had previously flagged two “material uncertainties” over its ability to continue as a going concern if the acquisition fell through. Those warnings clearly did not shake shareholder conviction.

The remaining formal step is a Gibraltar court sanction hearing, expected in Q4 2026 or Q1 2027, with deal completion targeted for the same window. Under the terms, Evoke shareholders will receive 0.537 new Bally’s Intralot shares for each Evoke share held, with the option to elect a cash alternative of 52 pence per share, subject to an overall cash cap of £117.1 million. If all Evoke shareholders opt for new Intralot shares, Evoke shareholders will own approximately 11.5% of the enlarged group, which will continue to trade on Euronext Athens under the ticker BYLOT.

Bally’s Intralot CEO Robeson Reeves has been clear that no immediate breakup of Evoke’s assets is planned. Speaking after the acquisition was announced in June, Reeves stated the transaction was pursued with the “whole group” in mind, and has maintained that both William Hill and 888 remain integral to the combined entity’s strategy. Evoke CEO Per Widerström has confirmed the approval process remains on schedule, with completion still expected “in the fourth quarter of 2026 or the first quarter of 2027.”

What the Combined Group Would Look Like?

The financial scale of the combined business is the detail that puts everything else in context. Reeves has previously outlined a combined group projecting revenues of approximately €3.2 billion and adjusted EBITDA of €856 million at a 27% margin, alongside identified synergies of at least €210 million, largely from marketing, operations, and IT infrastructure. Evoke’s own H1 2026 results, published on 12 August, showed a 12% decline in Q2 EBITDA after a £46 million year-on-year increase in gaming duties, again driven primarily by the UK. Two businesses facing the same tax pressure, combining under the same roof, will need those synergies to hold.

Expert Analysis

The Bally’s Intralot’s H1 figures have an underlying message that goes beyond the top-line revenue number itself. Despite bearing the brunt of nearly double the tax rate on UK remote gaming duty, the company managed to recover two-thirds of the impact during the same period and recorded record UK net gaming revenues. This is a stronger showing than a few other companies that are doing so under similar conditions. One such example is that of Evoke, which reported a decline of 9.5% in EBITDA Y-o-Y in H1.

The acquisition of Evoke, which has received shareholder approval and now awaits a court hearing, takes on a whole different perspective. The merger of William Hill, 888, Mr Green, Jackpotjoy, Botemania, and the existing lottery and B2B division of Intralot forms an organisation that is truly pan-European. How it will be possible to generate the estimated €210 million in synergies in light of a much higher level of consolidated debt, multiple technological systems, and continuous UK tax pressure will be the key issue moving forward. The vote was affirmative. Now comes the execution phase.