Youbet.com Reaches $1.0 Billion in Wagers
Friday February 4, 1:48 pm ET
Pari-Mutuel Horse Racing Site Triples Annual Handle in Last Three Years
WOODLAND HILLS, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb. 4, 2005--Youbet.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:UBET - News), the largest provider of online horse racing content in the U.S., revealed today that the Company has topped the $1.0 billion mark in total wagers processed since it started accepting bets in 1997. The $2.00 column-altering bet stepped through Youbet's secure wagering system on Monday January 31, 2005.
"The most gratifying part of reaching the $1.0 billion mark in total wagers processed is knowing that more than 70% of it has been amassed since the Company's new management team took over three years ago," said Charles F. Champion, CEO of the online wagering concern.
"Beginning with the 2002 racing season, we've tripled the amount we add to track pools annually," Champion continued, "a real come-from-behind accomplishment for a dot com survivor."
The handle increases are attributable, in part, to product enhancements that Youbet developed to make the excitement of live racing more accessible to younger, tech-savvy audiences. Today's site, for example, offers live 24-hour access to online race video plus handicapping, dual simultaneous race viewing and instant replays.
Total wagers also have accelerated with the addition of new racing venues to the Youbet site. Subscribers, who tend to be under forty years of age, can now bet on races being staged at more than 120 tracks in the United States and in Europe and Asia.
Nowhere is the increase in volume more evident than in the Company's Triple Crown programs. "Funny Cide (2003) and Smarty Jones (2004) captured imaginations of sports fans everywhere by each winning the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness Stakes," Champion said, "and we worked hard to catch the updraft.
"Last year, with an aggressive, highly targeted marketing program in place to capture the attention of customers and other horse racing enthusiasts, our handle for the Belmont Stakes, the Crown's third leg, rose 32% over 2003 and sign-ups for wagers rose 185%," Champion said.
Youbet's new management group, which took over Company operations in May of 2002, also moved quickly to quell concerns about advanced deposits by establishing a program called The Players Trust(SM). Created in November of that year with a major U.S. banking institution acting as custodian, the Trust houses and protects the deposits and winnings of Youbet's wagering customers without charge.
Youbet.com is the largest Internet provider of thoroughbred, quarter horse and harness horse racing content in the United States. Members have the ability to watch and, in most states, the ability to wager on vast majority of all major domestic horse racing content via Youbet.com's exclusive closed-loop network. Youbet.com members enjoy features that include commingled track pools, live audio/video, up-to-the-minute track information, real-time wagering information, phone wagering and value-added handicapping products.
Youbet.com is an official online wagering platform of Churchill Downs Incorporated and the Kentucky Derby. Youbet.com operates Youbet.com TotalAccess(TM), an Oregon-based hub for the acceptance and placement of wagers. More information on Youbet can be found at www.Youbet.com.
