Football flop for William Hill

WILLIAM Hill suffered its heaviest one-week loss in history last month as punters cashed-in on football.

The company said it lost £13m in the third week of January when ‘customerfriendly’ football results hit trading.

Football fans cleaned up as Arsenal beat Manchester City and heavilybacked favourites such as Manchester United and Chelsea won.

‘It was a significant week for us,’ said chief executive James Henderson.

News of William Hill’s losses came a day after rival Ladbrokes revealed it lost a record £8m on Boxing Day as the Premier League big boys won.

But the setback at William Hill last month was not enough to stop it celebrating a record year in 2014.

Results published yesterday showed revenues rose 8pc to £1.6bn and profits rose 13pc to £317.3m. The company raised its dividend from 11.6p a share to 12.2p but this did not prevent the stock from slipping 12.8p to 377p.

‘2014 was a record year for William Hill,’ said Henderson, who succeed Ralph Topping in the top job last summer having started out as a trainee at a betting shop in West London three decades ago.

He conceded that the losses in January ‘leaves us behind internal expectations’ for the first quarter of 2015 but added that the board ‘remains confident’ for the year.

‘The board’s view is that this volatility in sporting results is now a normal part of the group’s trading,’ he said, pointing to an increase in ‘accumulator’ betting on football when punters try to pick winners in a number of games.