7/29/2026

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

Good day, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Rush Street Interactive second quarter 2026 earnings conference call. All participants are in listen-only mode. A question and answer session will follow the formal presentation. Please note that this conference call is being recorded today, July 29, 2026. I will now turn the call over to Kyle Sauers, President and Chief Financial Officer. Please go ahead.

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

Thank you, Operator, and good afternoon. By now, everyone should have access to our second quarter 2026 earnings release. It can be found under the heading Financials Quarterly Results in the Investors section of the RSI website at ruststreetinteractive.com. Some of our comments will be forward-looking statements within the meaning of the federal securities laws. Forward-looking statements are not statements of historical fact and are usually identified by the use of words such as will, expect, should, or other similar phrases and are subject to numerous risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from what we expect. We assume no responsibility for updating any forward-looking statements. Therefore, you should exercise caution in interpreting and relying on them. We refer you to our SEC filings for a more detailed discussion of the risks that could impact our future operating results and financial condition. During the call, we will discuss our non-GAAP measures, which we believe can be useful in evaluating the company's operating performance. These measures should not be considered in isolation or as a substitute for our financial results prepared in accordance with GAAP. We will be discussing adjusted EBITDA, which we define as net income or loss before interest, income taxes, depreciation and amortization, share based compensation, adjustments for certain one-time or non-recurring items, and other adjustments that are either non-cash or not related to our underlying business performance. A reconciliation of these non-GAAP measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measure is available in our second quarter 2026 earnings release and our investor deck, which is available in the investor section of the RSI website at RushStreetInteractive.com. For purposes of today's call, unless noted otherwise, when discussing profitability, EBITDA, or other income statement measures other than revenue, we're referring to those items on a non-GAAP adjusted EBITDA basis. With me on the call today, we have Richard Schwartz, Chief Executive Officer, who will first provide some opening remarks and then open the call to questions. And with that, I'll turn the call over to Richard.

speaker
Richard Schwartz
Chief Executive Officer

Thanks, Kyle. And good afternoon, everyone. Before I dive into our second quarter results, I want to take a moment to acknowledge that while Kyle and I have the opportunity to present these results each quarter, our continued success is driven by the exceptionally smart dedicated and experienced management team we work with every day, as well as our talented employees across the organization. I want to thank the entire team for all their hard work and dedication and for once again delivering record revenue and adjusted EBITDA, which continues our consistent track record of strong performance. I'm particularly proud that we delivered our fastest quarterly revenue growth in over four years. even while operating from a significantly larger revenue base. We generated a revenue of $393.8 million, up 46% year over year, and adjusted EBITDA of $64.6 million, up 61% year over year. Our results this quarter reflect the continued strength of our Casino First strategy, disciplined execution across operating regions, alongside a well-planned and strongly executed World Cup period. Our casino-first approach remains the foundation of our business model. Online Casino continues to be our primary value driver, with sports betting and poker serving as important complementary products that drive incremental profitability, brand awareness, and bring new players into our ecosystem. Online Casino continues to be our fastest-growing product segment in both North America and Latin America. This quarter, Online Casino represented 72% of our revenue, with online sports betting contributing most of the remaining 28%, a mix that continues to support the consistent engagement, higher lifetime values, and stronger retention that come with our casino players. Player growth remained strong across both regions. Monthly active users in North America grew 51% year-over-year to over 296,000, with growth in our North American online casino market reaching 64% year-over-year. In Latin America, which includes Mexico, mouths grew 62% year-over-year to over 652,000, Across the company, we again delivered record first-time depositors and continue to deliver attractive player acquisition costs, reflecting the ongoing advancements in our brand awareness and marketing efficiency. We just finished a month of exciting World Cup soccer, and I'm incredibly proud of our teams and the results we produced. There was incredible effort and execution that went into our marketing programs, player engagement and operations, Merchandising our offerings in a compelling way to our players and, of course, ensuring our technology performed fast and reliably at record volumes. The end result was very successful outcomes, both in terms of near-term financial impact and, more importantly, impressive acquisition and reactivation efforts, especially in Latin America. In June and so far in July, our monthly active users in Latin America are up over 80%. Another good sign is that more than 25% of our new first-time depositors that joined us during the World Cup have engaged with our casino product as well. This is about 50% higher than what we saw during the Copa America two years ago. So this is an encouraging sign and validating that the work we've put into improving the cross-sell flows have delivered positive results. When it comes to the specific results, Both handle and hold came in very nicely for the World Cup in June. In fact, Q2 was our highest sports hold in Colombia since inception, driven by solid World Cup results. In North America, we also, again, had our highest sports hold since inception, driven by both NBA playoffs and positive World Cup results. This wasn't just good outcomes. It's a reflection of an improving product and improving mix of parlays and prop bets. that drive higher hold. Turning to the political situation in Columbia specifically, in June, Columbia held its widely anticipated presidential election. With the winning candidate scheduled to take office at the end of next week, we believe that his pro-business agenda will provide a constructive backdrop for our industry and for the broader operating environment in the country. These policies appear to be in stark contrast to the existing and opposing party. To be clear, the results of this election have no impact on our reported numbers or guidance today. The new government's broader review of prior tax decrees and future budgeting decisions remain outstanding. Therefore, consistent with our prior earnings call, our full year guidance continues to assume that the 16% TGR tax remains in effect through year end. will keep you updated if there are changes on the regulatory front within Columbia. We're also excited to announce that we successfully launched online casino and online sports in Alberta on July 13th. And while it's still very early days, we're encouraged by what we've seen so far. As a reminder, Alberta is transitioning out of an unlicensed market. So consistent with our experience in Ontario, we expect this to be a gradual build. On a population-adjusted basis, first-time depositors and daily active users are currently tracking at approximately twice the levels we saw in Ontario at the same point following launch. It's of course very early, but we are excited to watch the Alberta market build over the coming quarters. Moving on to the topic of prediction markets, this past quarter we filed an application for a CFTC designated contract market license. As we have stated previously, we continue to operate with a casino-first focus and do not intend to lean into the crowded sports-focused prediction market space. However, the prediction markets landscape is highly dynamic and we will continue to monitor developments in the space. And this filing ensures we have the flexibility to navigate all possible outcomes. As we look to the second half of 2026, We're off to a strong start in Alberta, a market with meaningful long-term opportunity, and we see continued significant growth ahead in the other markets where we operate. With that, I'll turn it back to Kyle to discuss the financial details.

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

Thanks, Richard. Let me walk you through the details of our second quarter performance. Record second quarter revenues of 393.8 million represents 46% year-over-year growth, a continuation of our accelerating growth and a new watermark for our fastest growth rate in over four years. This performance was driven by strong execution across all aspects of our business, particularly in our two areas of primary focus, online casino and Latin America. Gross margins for the quarter came in at 35.5%, a continuing improvement reflecting our faster growth in higher margin markets, but still negatively impacted by the temporary tax in place in Columbia. Marketing efficiency continues to be a key component of our success, with marketing expenses of $48.6 million in the quarter, an increase of 34% year-over-year, and representing 12.3% in total revenue, compared to 13.4% in the prior year period. As Richard mentioned, we continue to see attractive player acquisition costs alongside strong player growth. Therefore, we expect to continue investing marketing dollars throughout the second half of the year, particularly as we ramp in Alberta. In fact, because our efficiency continues to improve, even as we have been scaling up, we now expect to spend more on marketing than previously planned in the second half. As we've always said, when we find strong ROI opportunities, we will increase our marketing spend. G&A for the second quarter was $26.5 million or 6.7% of revenue compared to 7% in the prior year period. As previously discussed, while we were achieving leverage over this line item, we have been increasing our investments in people and technology in 2026 to support our growth. Turning to profitability, adjusted EBITDA reached a record $64.6 million, representing 61% year-over-year growth and 16.4% margins. We continue to demonstrate scalable profitability expansion through the operating leverage built into our business model. Additionally, while our year-over-year adjusted EBITDA growth remains strong, it's worth noting that on a sequential basis, Q1 had the benefit of no extra tax in Columbia for about two and a half months during the Constitutional Court's reversal of the prior emergency decree, whereas Q2, in the remainder of 2026, assumes a 16% VAT in Columbia. and for context, that benefit in the first quarter was around $7 million. Net income for the period was $29.3 million compared to $28.8 million in the prior year period, representing a 2% year-over-year increase. User acquisition and retention continue to be key pillars of our success. As Richard mentioned, our user growth this quarter hit record levels once again while also setting another record for first-time depositors. In North America, Monthly active users grew 51% year-over-year to over 296,000, with mouths in online casino markets growing 64% year-over-year. In Latin America, mouths grew 62% year-over-year to over 652,000. North American art mouth was $320 in the second quarter, down 18% year-over-year, but up modestly from the first quarter. As we discussed last quarter, this reflects the impact of our player acquisition levels. Newer player cohorts start at lower value than our established base, but we continue to see this as both healthy and consistent with our historical experience as these cohorts mature over time. In Latin America, our mile was $55, up 82% year over year. Reflecting continued strength across the region, the elimination of Bonacene and Columbia to offset last year's VAT on deposits, and favorable movements in the Colombian currency. Breaking down our performance by geography and product, we saw continued strength across all areas. In the second quarter, online casino revenues grew 40% and online sports betting revenue grew 64%. Regionally, revenue in North America grew 23% in the second quarter and revenue in Latin America grew 195%. Growth remained broad based across regions and products. and we continue to see the benefits of the brand awareness and player loyalty that we continue to build. Our balance sheet remains strong with $340 million in cash on hand as of June 30th and we still have zero debt on our books. In May, we completed a secondary offering of which we repurchased approximately $29 million worth of shares under our $50 million share repurchase program and then in addition, our board authorized a new $100 million share repurchase program, which allows us to continue to be opportunistic with share repurchases. Now turning to guidance, we now expect revenue in the range of 1.56 to $1.6 billion, representing year over year growth of 38 to 41%. At the midpoint of 1.58 billion, this represents a $65 million increase from our previous guidance and 39% year-over-year growth. This increase reflects continued share gains in North American iCasino, sustained outperformance across Latin America and a well-managed World Cup period. For adjusted EBITDA guidance, we now expect it to be in the range of 245 to 265 million, representing year-over-year growth of 59 to 72%. At the midpoint of 255 million, this represents a $15 million increase from our previous guidance and 66% year-over-year growth. This is inclusive of our plans to further lean in to that efficiency by increasing our marketing investments in the second half of the year. We're pleased by the continued strength of our business. We're growing both rapidly and profitably, and we remain confident in our ability to deliver on our full-year guidance. And with that, operator, we're ready to take questions.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. Please limit yourself to one question and one follow up. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one to raise your hand. To withdraw your question, press star one again. We ask that you pick up your handset when asking a question to allow for optimal sound quality. If you are muted locally, please remember to unmute your device. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. Your first call is from Bernie McTernan from Needham. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

speaker
Bernie McTernan
Analyst, Needham

Great. Thanks for taking the questions. Just had a question on the World Cup customers that you were acquiring. I know it's early days, but any thoughts on the LTV of those customers, maybe versus customers you were acquiring previously? And then I have a follow-up.

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, it's a good question, Bernie. I think you're right. It is probably too early to tell for sure. certainly you're going to have some players who are joining just for the cultural moment and the excitement around their country and their team but I think we've proven in the past that in events like this we can bring people in get them excited about the platform and keep them around we mentioned on the prepared remarks that we had really good success early on with CrossCell in Latin America over to the casino side quite a bit more so than we did in the Copa America a couple years ago. So we're real excited about that. But you're right, it's pretty early on that.

speaker
Bernie McTernan
Analyst, Needham

Okay, understood. And then just wanted to double-click on the marketing commentary in the second half of the year, now investing more than previously planned. Can you just dive into that a little bit more? Is that all Alberta or anywhere else that you're spending? Thank you.

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, no, good question. I think, as you already know, we've increased marketing pretty significantly this year. I think we're up for the whole first half. Maybe it's around 25%, 26% so far. But I think as the data we've continued to share, the results are really, really strong out of our marketing teams and the strategies they're using. So we just feel like it makes sense to push harder. The player value's are still really good. We've continued to push our cost to acquire players lower. So certainly there's more spend because of Alberta and because of that launch a couple weeks ago. But really what we were referencing in the call is that we're going to push harder on spend in other markets where we see opportunities. And we're going to, like we always have, we're going to move quickly and be dynamic. So if If something isn't working, we'll probably pull back. And at the same time, if other things are working really well, we're going to lean in further. So maybe just to put a number around it, which I'll go back to the fact that we're going to remain flexible, but maybe sequentially from Q2 to Q3, we might spend something like $7 to $10 million more on marketing in Q3 compared to Q2. and that's inclusive of the Alberta launch.

speaker
Bernie McTernan
Analyst, Needham

Understood. Thanks, Kyle.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

Your next question is from the line of David Katz at Jefferies. Your line is open. Please go ahead. As a reminder, please remember to unmute your handset.

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

Maybe we go to the next person, operator, and we can circle back to David.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

Your next call is from Zach Silverbird at Wells Fargo. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.

speaker
Zach Silverbird
Analyst, Wells Fargo

Hey, good afternoon, and thank you for taking my question. In the press release and some of the management commentary, you mentioned that, you know, you continue to see meaningful long-term opportunities ahead of you guys to drive shareholder value. Can you maybe quantify or qualify some of that and, you know, provide some color on what those opportunities might be?

speaker
Richard Schwartz
Chief Executive Officer

Yeah, hey, Zach, it's Richard. I think that Two areas that I would just focus on clearly is that we have a large percentage of the population in America, North America, that are not yet legal. Frontline Casino in South Alberta just launching on July 13th and represents a really meaningful new opportunity for us. What I would also indicate is that within existing markets where we're operating today, I think because historically our brand doesn't have the same high awareness as some of the other brands we compete with, there's a large percentage of the population in these jurisdictions that haven't really had their first experience with us. And when they do have it, it's a positive experience for the most part, which is why we've been able to deliver the type of results where we're growing share and getting exposure from new players to our platform for the first time in many cases. So I think we're really excited for the ability to us to continue to grow share in our existing markets. And also, naturally, we have these other, you know, 88% of the US population, which today is not yet and many more. We certainly are really excited by all the opportunities ahead of us.

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

One thing I would add to that is that's going to drive the top line, which is obviously key to the success, but as we have been doing for several years now pretty consistently, we'd expect to be able to get leverage over all of our different P&L line items as we continue to grow.

speaker
Zach Silverbird
Analyst, Wells Fargo

Gotcha. I appreciate that. And just for my follow-up, maybe if you guys have any updated view or outlook on the potential legalization landscape, we've heard from one of your peers that they're kind of expecting Virginia, D.C., obviously we know about Maine, Maryland, maybe just any commentary on that would be great. Thank you.

speaker
Richard Schwartz
Chief Executive Officer

Sure. I mean, for us, each new online casino market is meaningful to us. So we're working hard, as we've said in the past, to try to educate legislators to try to improve the pace of legalization. We remain optimistic with a long-term outlook for iGaming and believe that additional jurisdictions will legalize over time. I think one of the key drivers is going to certainly be that reduction in federal support and some increased fiscal responsibilities for states over the next two fiscal years. is going to create even more pressure on funding gaps that we think the reductions in major social programs in many states, including some of the very large population of states like Illinois and New York, are going to create opportunities for a greater emphasis on new and sustainable sources of recurring revenue. So we believe that's going to drive a discussion around proven revenue-generating policy proposals like online casino legalization. So I think between protecting consumers and for the first time starting in October of this year, you're gonna start to see some impact, some of these major social programs reductions and so I think that's gonna become real and that's gonna be in terms of deficits and gaps the states are gonna have and so we feel like it's a good time to kind of have a momentum being built. So we feel, in terms of specific states, I did know that MGM referenced a couple of states yesterday. I think Virginia clearly is one that progressed further during the 2026 legislative sessions, and each chamber passed its own authorization bill before they failed to reconcile it before they adjourned, but there's certainly going to be another effort this next year. DC, you referenced, certainly that's an active opportunity. Indiana, Ohio, our other markets that we have an eye on and we're monitoring and being active when possible to try to accelerate some of the adoption opportunities there.

speaker
Zach Silverbird
Analyst, Wells Fargo

Thanks for all the call.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

Your next question is from the line of Jed Kelly at Oppenheimer. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.

speaker
Jed Kelly
Analyst, Oppenheimer

Thanks for taking my questions. Just circling back on the MAUs. Are you seeing any change in the CAC or what's going on with the spending? Can you just talk about more where your North American MA use is coming from? Is it more slots first or are you having more success with some of your sports first customers that might be a little more table game centric?

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

Thanks. Good question, Jed. I think the reality is that our cost to acquire players has continued to go down. Most of our spend in North America has been in the markets that include iCasino. And a lot of that is slots first type creative. Obviously, we welcome all kinds of players and we're catering to table players as well. And clearly, we're still doing quite well in sports. But most of it is casino first. and the cost to acquire players has continued to go down. And the player values continue to hold up as well. So it's the primary reason that we're going to be spending more in the back half because there's a lot of opportunity there.

speaker
Jed Kelly
Analyst, Oppenheimer

Got it. And then just as a follow up, when you kind of look at the sports that are getting most of the prediction market share, Tennis, I think, is doing about 2x the amount of baseball. Do you have any insight on what's going on there? And are you seeing certain pockets of your sports handle maybe down sort of because it's going more to a sharper player or anything you're seeing in some of, I mean, kind of tennis in particular, if there's anything to call out? Thanks.

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, I don't think we have anything to call out there that we've seen as a big change. but it's an interesting call out.

speaker
Jed Kelly
Analyst, Oppenheimer

Thank you and good job.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

Thanks, Jed. Your next call is from the line of David Katz from Jefferies. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.

speaker
David Katz
Analyst, Jefferies

Thanks. Hi. Good evening. Appreciate the comeback around. It was a misunderstanding with a mute button. I wanted to... Just go back. Good evening. I just wanted to go back to the retention of, you know, these high volumes of players that, you know, you are capturing, you know, during the World Cup. I think, Richard, in your prepared remarks, you talked about the ability to cross them over to sports being 50% higher than from Copa. You know, but if we look out into the future, Your ability to retain those people in your system over time. Is there any perspective or any data you can give us to that end?

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, so I think it's challenging to have a great comparable to this event. The World Cup, as we all know, was in the right time zone this time around for People in the Americas to watch it and engage in a lot more meaningful way. Our business has changed dramatically since the last World Cups, even since the COPPA, which was more of a LATAM event for us. In North America, we had really, really good engagement. It was more about a reactivation and using the World Cup as a pop culture event to engage people across the platform. And in Latin America, it was a really big player acquisition opportunity for us and we were really, really pleased with how that turned out. One thing I'll point out is that after Copa, even though I just mentioned it's not the greatest comparable because we're so much larger at this point, the product's better, but we saw a nice inflection After Copa in our casino volumes down in Columbia. And so we're certainly hoping to be able to capitalize on a similar situation this time around. So I think good early signals, but too early to give too much detail.

speaker
David Katz
Analyst, Jefferies

Understood. And if I can ask one follow-up from a longer-term nature. I noticed some of the other Latin American countries that you've listed as potential future opportunities, at least the last couple of quarters in your deck. How far away and what are the gating factors for those to become a reality?

speaker
Richard Schwartz
Chief Executive Officer

Yeah, thanks for that question. So as you can imagine, we're very thorough here and we're very focus on making sure that we pick the right markets to enter, and we do so in the proper way where we're prepared for success. And so there are markets down there that, as you know, are legal and regulated that are exciting, but we're happy to sort of have a lot of growth, as you see, in our existing markets, and we have to be very thoughtful how we invest in additional markets. But there are thoughts and efforts going into additional expansion in other markets down there, but certainly it's not something we're prepared to share at this time.

speaker
David Katz
Analyst, Jefferies

OK, thank you very much.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

Thanks, David. Your next call is from the line of Dan Pulitzer from JP Morgan. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.

speaker
Dan Pulitzer
Analyst, JPMorgan

Hey, good afternoon, everyone, and thanks for the questions. First, I want to touch on the prediction markets, the application you filed with the CFTC. I know you mentioned that you don't intend to lean into the sports area here. But I guess, can you talk about maybe what does this allow you to do specifically? Do you envision yourself as, you know, a taker or maker? Is this kind of, you know, just kind of a way to kind of give yourself optionality? How are you thinking about this kind of in the medium or longer term?

speaker
Richard Schwartz
Chief Executive Officer

Yeah, we do view the applications as a way to preserve our strategic flexibility to maintain our optionality, as you just mentioned, and ensure that we're not caught flat footed should the market or regulatory environment evolve in a way that becomes relevant for our business. So it's really just being prepared and preserving optionality.

speaker
Dan Pulitzer
Analyst, JPMorgan

Okay, great. And then can you talk about maybe what you're seeing in terms of the competitive environment within iGaming? Obviously, you've been acquiring a lot of users. I know that you're seeing it sounds like strong LTVs and CACs. But, you know, in Michigan or any other states, have you seen any incremental competition or even wallet impact from prediction markets?

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

So I think on your last piece on the prediction markets, I think the answer is we don't believe so. Obviously, it's hard to know for sure. I think on the competitive intensity, listen, it depends on the number of operators in a given state or market in North America, of course. But there's really good competition, and we've had to deal with that for a long time. There are some new competitors that have entered in a couple of our markets, which certainly increases the competition. And we've had some of our competitors who have, I think, recognized that iCasino is a great place to focus on and have talked about putting more efforts there. But all the while that that's been happening, we've been consistently growing market share for, I think, four straight quarters here. So we're very proud of that.

speaker
Dan Pulitzer
Analyst, JPMorgan

Understood. Thanks so much.

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

Thanks, Dan.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

Your next question is from the line of Ryan Sigdahl from Craig Hallam Capital Group. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.

speaker
Ryan Sigdahl
Analyst, Craig-Hallum Capital Group

Hey, good afternoon, Richard, Kyle. I want to double click on the World Cup, the activations. Well, let's start reactivations in North America. Just given that strong 25% cross-sell to iCasino, was there a specific... and many more.

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

That data point that Richard had given, that was related to Latin America. So I just want to make sure that that was clear. And I think you're right. There was a lot of different efforts and different styles of marketing and trying to attract different types of players. We definitely leaned into sports first and World Cup first in the Latin American markets and obviously had a lot of success with that. I don't know. Maybe Clarify if I missed a piece of your question there.

speaker
Ryan Sigdahl
Analyst, Craig-Hallum Capital Group

Yeah, just on the reactivations in North America, if there was a specific focus on maybe players that had gone, you know, weren't active anymore, gone inactive, but had played iCasino in the past, if they were a greater focus. Just curious how you kind of focused from an activation reactivation on iCasino players.

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, it was across the board, right? I mean, when you think about reactivations, you You know who the people are and you know information about them, so you can tailor the messaging and the creative to them based on what you know about their past experiences and their interests. So I think it was kind of all of the above there.

speaker
Ryan Sigdahl
Analyst, Craig-Hallum Capital Group

Very good. Just for a quick follow-up, Kyle, the increased marketing spend, that is pure kind of marketing spend through OpEx, right? Curious how you think about promotions in conjunction with that.

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, so yes, that increase is intended to show up in the marketing line on the P&L, correct? From a bonusing perspective, obviously the more new players we're bringing in, that can have an impact on bonusing. I think we've continued to refine our bonusing strategies Adjust those as we go, and it's different depending on the market, the rules, how taxes are affected by bonusing, how players engage with bonusing. I'll point out that our bonusing sequentially, and this is a North American comment, but bonusing sequentially is down in Q2, up a little bit year over year. But it's an area we spend a lot of money on bonusing, right? We pay a lot of attention to it, and we want to make sure The right bonuses are going to the right people. Other than hopefully extra new players coming in because of extra marketing spend and some associated bonusing with them, I wouldn't think about a big change in bonusing strategy otherwise outside of typical seasonality heading into the football season.

speaker
Ryan Sigdahl
Analyst, Craig-Hallum Capital Group

Great. Thanks, guys. Thanks, John.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

Thanks, Ryan. Your next question is from the line of Mike Hickey at StoneX. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.

speaker
Mike Hickey
Analyst, StoneX

Hey, Richard, Kyle. Congrats, guys. Awesome quarter. I guess the first topic, Kyle, the second half revenue and EBITDA cadence. Post 2Q here, how should we think about, I guess post 2Q and your raised numbers for the year, how should we think about the relative cadence of revenue and EBITDA between 3Q and 4Q?

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, good question. Good question, Mike. I think first thing I'll point out, we mentioned that we had really strong hold in Q2 on the sports side. So Q2 was aided by that and probably benefited revenue by around $10 million. So after you net that out of Q2 results to think about the sequential look going forward at the midpoint of our guidance, I'd probably expect Q3 revenue to be relatively flat with Q2. So X that 10 million, Q3 being up by around 10 million over Q2. Obviously there's a range of outcomes around that, but that's the way I think about it. And then like we typically do, we'd expect a real nice uptick in revenue from Q3 into the fourth quarter. If I move to EBITDA cadence, If you think about a revenue that's kind of flat from Q2 to Q3, we're talking about additional marketing spend in Q3, particularly with the Alberta launch, and then spending even more in marketing than we previously planned. I think it's likely that Q3 EBITDA will be the low quarter of the year for us, and then with Q4 being a sizable step up in EBITDA due to much larger revenue. and then moving away from the Alberta launch costs. So I think that's largely in line with what analysts are already modeling given our previous commentary and kind of historical results. And I guess maybe you didn't ask this one, but while I'm at it, I'll talk about adjusted EPS real quick as we've become kind of consistently growing and profitable to metric that some investors are looking at in addition to EBITDA. So just a few components for people to be able to have some help with modeling. And I'm going to give you exact amounts. But keep in mind, there's a range of outcomes associated with each of these. But depreciation and amortization is probably around $47 million for the full year. Stock comp expense is around $30 million for the year. Interest income, around $12 million. Tax expense of around $74 million. And then a fully due share count. around 237 million. So at the midpoint of guidance, if it's just all those numbers, midpoint of the guidance, that gets you to about 62 cents in adjusted EPS for the year. So as people are modeling, hopefully that gives a little more color that everyone can look back at.

speaker
Mike Hickey
Analyst, StoneX

Nice. Thanks, Kyle. Keep you talking here. Maybe, Richard, too, just on your 28% Thank you, Kyle. I mean, is it sort of the unlock for growth if you retain and cross sell like you expect, or is that elevated volume and the success that you had sort of more of a challenge for you as you look at 28? Thanks, guys.

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, so I'll take that last piece first, maybe. There's certainly a comp element there. I think we're – because it added a significant number of games to the meaningful soccer schedule For the world in 2026, right? So there is a does impact comps next year and we had nice hold. So that's an element. I feel very good that with the rest of our growth profile and the number of players we've added and reactivated through that big event that that'll help us push through those tougher comps next year. You said 2028. I'm not seeing you talking about 2027. I did mean 2027.

speaker
Dan Pulitzer
Analyst, JPMorgan

Yeah.

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

Sorry about that. So we don't skip a year here. Way ahead. So, you know, it's probably a little early for that. We'll give 2027 guidance in a couple of quarters. But I think here's a few things to think about. You know, we're obviously in a growth industry, a really nice growth industry today. and we've been able to consistently take share in the North American iCasino market where we're focused in North America. So I think in 2027, I think we feel good about taking our fair share of the industry growth. In North American sports, I wouldn't expect as much growth from us. That part of the industry has slower growth and we aren't investing as much or that much in player acquisition in the sports-only markets. And then if you go south to Latin America, again, the markets that we're live in are growing really nicely. We believe we're taking share in all of those markets and we'd expect those to be significant growth drivers for us. And then, you know, if you move down the P&L, I'd expect that we'll continue to see operating leverage again next year, just like we've seen over the last four years. We're growing more quickly in our higher margin markets. So with all else being similar, the revenue mix alone should improve our gross margins. Even when adding in the investment market of Alberta, we'd expect to get leverage over marketing spend next year. I suspect the same would be the case with G&A as well. And the only wild card I would throw in is if, back to a question Richard was responding to earlier, If we have a new state or two in the United States legalize and launch iGaming next year, that would change the profile a little bit, but I'm sure that's something we would all welcome.

speaker
Mike Hickey
Analyst, StoneX

Nice. Thanks, guys. Good luck.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

Thanks, Mike. Your next question is from the line of Joe Stoff at Susquehanna. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.

speaker
Joe Stoff
Analyst, Susquehanna

Good afternoon, or good evening, Richard, Kyle. You know, your North American active growth is impressive. But I was wondering if you could talk just structurally about, you know, how this pays off and when it pays off in terms of, you know, say, you know, ARPMAL. You know, if, and I don't know how you want to discuss that, but certainly, you know, it's been fertile. Your active growth has accelerated to even higher this quarter. It seems likely to continue given the investment, and it's paid off. Just wondering how to think about, you know, if you were to normalize your level of marketing, you know, how we see that sort of in the art mode. Does a new customer that you acquired call it, you know, In the third quarter, do they contribute maybe a corporate level art mile a year later? Just talking about details of how an iCasino new customer ramps in that spending. I don't know what you could share with us.

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, so without getting into exact numbers, it's a good question, Joe. First of all, I'd say I think it's already paying off when you look at our growth across the business. Our player counts are driving, our added players are driving a lot of growth, right? In terms of the progression of the value of players or maybe a player cohort, there's two things that happen. The longer players stay with us, the more valuable they become. And also, the retention improves dramatically. So there's a natural fall off. For us and for this industry of players that get acquired and early on, you're going to lose a decent amount of those players, at least for a while. And then their value builds over time. In iCasino, that payback is faster than in sports. At least that's been our experience. In terms of what, you know, I don't want to get in the habit of forecasting art mouth. You know, future quarters, future years. If and when our player growth slows, which we're at a pretty high clip right now, so that's probably natural that it's going to happen at some point, that's when it's more likely to see that our MAO increase. You know, it was, I think we pointed out that it improved a little bit sequentially, which I think is great. This is actually, this is more on the MAO side, but, you know, the denominator, but This is the first quarter in six years, or first second quarter in six years, where we had a higher player count in North America in the second quarter than the first quarter. So it just tells you how much we're driving growth there and how much of it is casino-led and not as dependent on the sports season. So hopefully that gives you a little bit to think about there without going into a lot of quantification.

speaker
Joe Stoff
Analyst, Susquehanna

Yeah, no, I appreciate that. And just to clarify, you know, in Columbia, Richard, you had mentioned sort of the pathway we'll see next week, you know, where the, I guess the executive branch of the Colombian government and how they, you know, if they're going to remove that tax or not. But just remind me, is there a constitutional court pathway as well that's active similar to the last one?

speaker
Richard Schwartz
Chief Executive Officer

Yeah, there is. And there is a Your next question is from the line of Jordan Bender at Citizens. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.

speaker
Jordan Bender
Analyst, Citizens

Hey, everyone. Thanks for the question. Maybe to start more broadly, you know, you've obviously had a ton of success down in Latin America under the Rush Vet brand. Would you guys ever look to bring that to the U.S. just to kind of cater to some of the Spanish-speaking population here?

speaker
Richard Schwartz
Chief Executive Officer

Yeah, Jordan, it's a conversation we do have internally at times, and certainly it's something we've considered and thought about. I think certainly a multi-brand strategy is something that every operator at to consider at some point. Some have already pulled the trigger on that. Certainly, I think that for us, it comes down to the right timing to try to address multiple brands in a similar market. Some jurisdictions are easier to have multiple brands. Some are more challenging. But ultimately, I do think that we have an opportunity to really cater to some of the Spanish-speaking Americans who certainly would probably prefer at times to play a site that's very native for their preferred language.

speaker
Jordan Bender
Analyst, Citizens

Thank you. And just to follow up, just to kind of take another swing at some of the incremental marketing costs, 3Q, that comes at a time when you're normally ahead of the NFL season. You get a ton of spend from the sports bidding industry this year. We all kind of can imagine how much is going to be spent on the prediction market side. Is the increase in marketing going into 3Q, is there anything within that to say maybe that's a little reactionary to what is to come or is it truly the customer economics of what you're seeing are just very attractive and you're just stepping in ahead of that?

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

I would say zero of it is in reaction to what others are doing and where they're spending and that we feel like we have to match something. It is all about the player economics, the player values and the economics around acquiring those players and how successful we've been and actually improvements we've continued to make within our marketing programs and technology where we think we can spend more and do it at the same rates.

speaker
Jordan Bender
Analyst, Citizens

Understood. Thank you.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

Thanks, Jordan. As a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please press star one to raise your hand. To withdraw your question, press star one again. Your next question is from the line of Chad Bainon from Macquarie. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.

speaker
Chad Bainon
Analyst, Macquarie

Hi, afternoon. Thanks for taking my question. Just one from us tonight, just around the prediction markets, again, more related to, I guess, what you saw at the end of the second quarter during the World Cup and maybe into the third quarter. We've seen lots of data in terms of prediction market volumes that are out there. I think most of it's probably in the states where you don't participate. But just wondering if you could add any additional commentary if you believe that in the states where you have sports betting, so 28% of your business, if you have seen decelerating volume trends or anything else that you can kind of talk to to help us think about the trajectory of OSB into the back half. Thanks.

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, I'll start. I think the answer is no, we haven't seen... That impact. But it's also true that we probably don't have perfect visibility into it. I think the fact that we're not focusing on new player acquisition in sports-only markets and we're doing as well as we are in sports relative to our peers probably tells you that we're not being impacted by it a whole lot.

speaker
Richard Schwartz
Chief Executive Officer

I would just add as well that we're not catering to the sharp customers either, you know, potentially the way they may find the prediction markets more appealing than maybe a conventional sports book.

speaker
Kyle Sauers
President and Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, one other thing I was just going to clarify for you, because you did say, you know, you mentioned 28% of our revenue, but you got to keep in mind that about half of that, maybe more than half of it, if I went back and checked, is coming from Latin America. So That isn't at risk in the areas that you're referring to. Thank you both. Appreciate it. Thanks a lot.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

There are no further questions at this time. We have reached the end of the Q&A session. I will now turn the call back to Richard Schwartz for closing remarks.

speaker
Richard Schwartz
Chief Executive Officer

Thank you again for joining us today. We look forward to updating you on our progress when we share our third quarter results in the fall.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

This concludes today's call. Thank you for attending. You may now disconnect.

Disclaimer

This conference call transcript was computer generated and almost certianly contains errors. This transcript is provided for information purposes only.EarningsCall, LLC makes no representation about the accuracy of the aforementioned transcript, and you are cautioned not to place undue reliance on the information provided by the transcript.

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