Global Gaming Technology (GGT) has concluded the transfer of its Italian local payment operations to PostePay – Designated Assets IMEL for €700 million ($697.4 million).
The agreement, which was disclosed in February, was finalized through GGT’s lottery subsidiary and encompassed LIS Holding and LISPAY subsidiaries, which collectively managed GGT’s local payment operations.
The business offers services through a wholly owned payment technology platform and 54,000 points of sale, including bill payments and prepaid cards, telecom and e-voucher refills, and technical solutions such as merchant and business services.
The negotiated sale price represents a company value of €630 million and roughly €70 million of net unrestricted funds. GGT also stated that the business held approximately €140 million of unrestricted funds at the time of the transaction.
GGT added that it plans to utilize the proceeds from the sale primarily to cover transaction costs and reduce debt.
The sale follows GGT’s announcement last month that it would allocate $150 million to cover “potential losses” related to a lawsuit from its former subsidiary DoubleDown.
In its second-quarter financial statement, IGT documented a $150 million non-operating cost classified as “potential losses associated with ongoing legal battles and related claims with DoubleDown.”
DoubleDown’s former patrons, a social gaming enterprise that was previously a subsidiary of IGT, filed a collective action lawsuit against the company, asserting that its social casino games, where players can opt to buy tokens for gameplay, constitute illicit gambling in Washington state.
The legal action was initially submitted in 2017, the year IGT divested DoubleDown, and has progressed through numerous phases of legal proceedings. Nevertheless, in the second-quarter earnings report, IGT acknowledged that the probability of a loss was greater than the probability of no loss, and consequently recorded a $150 million charge to cover potential losses.
The DoubleDown case is one of several social gaming lawsuits in Washington state, with Big Fish Games establishing a $155 million settlement fund in May 2020 to reimburse players for funds lost playing its games over the preceding year.
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