Evolution Gaming blamed lowering channelisation rates across Europe for further revenue declines in Q1.
The supplier reported a Q1 net revenue of €513 million, marking a 1.5% decline year-on-year. Group CEO Martin Carlesund told analysts on Wednesday that regional development “was somewhat mixed in the quarter, [as] Europe is not performing well at the moment”.
Looking at Evolution customer data, based on their IP addresses, Carlesund estimated that about 48% of its revenue was regulated in Q1.
“Due to that regulation in some markets fails to strike the right balance between player protection and entertainment, players continue to access unregulated operators and channelisation is decreasing fast and significantly. This harms the total business and the most vulnerable players lose the player protection of playing of regulated operators and search by products from Evolution,” the CEO said of its performance in Europe during the period.
He specifically highlighted poor channelisation in the UK and Netherlands and Sweden as pain points.
LatAm has ‘great momentum’
Meanwhile LatAm and North America, he said, had “great momentum” and “steady growth” respectively.
“Both North America and LatAm reported yet another all-time high revenue. Growth rate in North America improved compared to the fourth quarter. It looks somewhat soft in our reporting currency, euro, but in US dollars, year-on-year growth was roughly 21% compared to 19% in Q4,” Carlesund said.
He explained the company was shifting its focus away from Europe and onto the Americas, as it launched several prominent new titles in recent months and had acquired a developer in Argentina. He described Europe as “the main headache right now”.
“The US and LatAm are where we will invest the most in 2026. Both regions have high potential with life still being in the early days,” Carlesund added.
Further afield he said Africa has continued to grow from a small base. “Fresh games are widely popular in the region, and our recently launched Red Baron has so far exceeded expectations. Also, our RMG offering is starting to gain traction.”
Europe remains attractive in long term
Despite Carlesund’s poor outlook on Europe in the short-term, the operator is positive on its long-term opportunity. He told analysts on Wednesday that regulatory changes were causing the impact, but “regulators will eventually have to adopt [and] adapt to protect the players and not by force, but by some regulation, get them back into the regulated part of the market”.
Last year Evolution ring-fencing across its European operations, to ensure it was not providing services to the black market. This was in response to an investigation launched by the UK Gambling Commission into its illegal market activity in the UK.
Carlesund had previously lamented how much this project has cost in 2025, resulting in an impact on overall profitability.
Original article: https://igamingbusiness.com/finance/evolution-pivots-to-americas-as-regulated-revenue-sits-at-48/
