Lottomatica Q3 2026 results show adjusted EBITDA up 3% to €200m, and up 17% to €234m at a normalised sports betting payout, Lottomatica Group said on 3 November. Nine-month adjusted EBITDA grew 8% to €665m.
The gap between the two quarterly figures is the story of the year so far. Lottomatica grew on almost every volume measure, while sports results that went in bettors’ favour took about €34m off reported quarterly EBITDA, on the company’s own normalised calculation.
The board approved the interim accounts for the nine months to 30 September on 2 November. Lottomatica kept its 2026 guidance and said normalised adjusted EBITDA for the year is expected at the upper end of the range.
Lottomatica Q3 2026 results in numbers
Third-quarter revenue rose 5% to €537m, according to the results statement. Online revenue grew 13% to €256m and was the only segment to grow. Sports Franchise, the retail betting network, slipped 1% to €101m, and Gaming Franchise, the retail gaming machine business, fell 2% to €180m.
Wagering told a stronger story than revenue. Sports Franchise stakes rose 15% in the quarter, faster than the 11% growth for the nine months, which means the revenue decline in retail betting came from payout, not from fewer bets.
Lottomatica normalises sports betting at an 80.5% payout for retail and 85.5% for online. On that basis, nine-month revenue would have grown 10%, against the 5% reported, and nine-month adjusted EBITDA would have reached €715m, up 19%, the company said.
| Nine months (€m) | 9M 2025 | 9M 2026 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Total revenue | 1,640 | 1,718 | +5% |
| Online revenue | 689 | 781 | +13% |
| Sports Franchise revenue | 382 | 377 | -1% |
| Gaming Franchise revenue | 570 | 560 | -2% |
| Adjusted EBITDA | 617 | 665 | +8% |
| Operating cash flow | 504 | 545 | +8% |
Source: Lottomatica Group 9M 2026 results statement, January to September 2025 and 2026.
Online now earns two thirds of group profit
Online wagers rose 12% to €24.2bn in the first nine months, out of total group wagers of €35.2bn, up 8%. Gross gaming revenue (GGR) for the group grew 2% to €3.52bn.
Online adjusted EBITDA rose 17% to €442.9m, and the margin widened to 56.7% from 54.8%. At a normalised payout, the online segment’s EBITDA would have grown 24%. On our calculation from the company’s tables, online supplied 66.6% of group adjusted EBITDA in the nine months, against 61.2% a year earlier, on 45% of revenue.
The growth came with more market share. Lottomatica’s share of Italy’s online market, measured on GGR, reached 31.7% in the third quarter, up 0.9 percentage points year on year. Its share of online sports betting rose 2.1 points to 34.8%, and its share of online casino and gaming rose 0.6 points to 31.2%.
The company said online revenue grew with the overall market and with share gains across every product and every brand, partly offset by less favourable sports results than in 2025.
Retail: payout hits betting, machines slip
The payout effect is sharpest in Sports Franchise. Nine-month adjusted EBITDA for the retail betting network fell 16% to €86.9m, and the margin dropped to 23.1% from 27.0%. At a normalised payout, the same segment would have grown EBITDA 28%, according to the statement, the fastest of the three divisions.
Gaming Franchise is the segment without a payout excuse. Revenue fell 2% to €560.3m, wagers fell 2% to €7.88bn and EBITDA slipped 1% to €135.6m, with the margin almost unchanged at 24.2%. The segment includes the Cristaltec group and Agesoft, which Lottomatica reports inside the division.
Profit, cash and debt
Lower financing costs added to the profit gain. Financial charges fell to €111.4m from €160.2m in the nine months, after the 2025 refinancing, which carried a €21m make-whole payment. Net profit rose 58% to €155.3m, and profit attributable to the group grew to €148.2m from €93.3m. Adjusted net profit was €263m.
Operating cash flow, which Lottomatica calculates as adjusted EBITDA after recurring and concession capex, rose to €544.9m from €504.0m. Recurring capex rose to €74.4m, and concession spending stayed at €46.2m.
Shareholders took most of that cash. Lottomatica spent €368.2m on share buybacks in the nine months, against €64.3m a year earlier, and paid €105.1m in dividends. In the same period it issued €765m of senior secured notes due 2032 and repaid €400m of floating-rate notes due 2031.
Net financial debt stood at €2.16bn on 30 September, up from €2.11bn at the end of 2025. The debt ratio was unchanged at 2.4 times last-twelve-month run-rate adjusted EBITDA of €911.2m, a figure that is pro forma for bolt-on acquisitions and the run-rate savings from PWO.
The third quarter of 2026 marks another quarter of strong growth for Lottomatica, with a double-digit increase in Online and Sports wagers and in normalised Adjusted EBITDA (+17% yoy at normalised payout). We also reached an important strategic milestone with the announcement of the acquisition of CIRSA, which will significantly strengthen our scale and future growth opportunities.
Guglielmo Angelozzi, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Lottomatica Group, in the results statement (translated from Italian)
What does CIRSA change for Lottomatica?
The CIRSA merger turns Lottomatica from an Italian operator into a group with two home markets. Under the all-share deal announced in September, each CIRSA share becomes 0.668 new Lottomatica shares, and CIRSA shareholders will own about 32.5% of the combined company.
The two companies’ boards approved the common merger plan in October, according to the Italian news agency Teleborsa. CIRSA will pay its shareholders €1.56 per share, about €262m, before the merger takes effect. After closing, Lottomatica’s board plans to propose a €744m capital distribution, as an extraordinary dividend, a partial tender offer for its own shares, or both.
The deal also sets the 2026 dividends: up to €130m from Lottomatica and up to €100m from CIRSA, payable by 30 June 2027. CIRSA shareholders who vote against can exit at €13.20 per share, and the merger is void if those exits pass 5% of CIRSA’s shares. The merger documents are on CIRSA’s merger page.
The Spanish operator reported its own figures on 4 November: CIRSA’s Q3 revenue rose 12% to €628m and adjusted EBITDA grew 11.1% to €203m. CIRSA also lost about €10m of EBITDA to customer-friendly sports results in August and September, the same pattern Lottomatica reported in Italy.
Combined, the two groups generated more than €1.26bn of adjusted EBITDA in the first nine months of 2026, on the companies’ reported figures: €665m at Lottomatica and €599m at CIRSA. Italy and Spain would supply 80% of combined EBITDA, according to CIRSA’s results presentation.
Italy’s online market as the base
The merger arrives as Italy’s 46 online licensees head into the 2027 test of the online reform. Lottomatica’s online segment now includes the revenue of Sportbet and of Bgame’s sports betting business, in line with how management tracks the division, according to the statement.
Italy’s regulated online market generates about €5bn of GGR a year, according to our Italy iGaming market report. At that size, each percentage point of share Lottomatica adds is worth about €50m of GGR a year.
Next steps
CIRSA shareholders vote on the merger at an extraordinary meeting on 30 November in Terrassa, with a second call on 1 December, and Lottomatica holds its own extraordinary meeting to approve the plan and the share issue. Antitrust filings are under review in Italy, Spain, Mexico and Morocco, along with a foreign subsidies notification to the European Commission. Closing is expected in the second quarter of 2027, after regulatory approvals.
Source: Lottomatica Group
