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Coral seriously preparing for £800 million flotation
Published: 2005-08-01
 Published on : Mon, 01 Aug 2005 03:35
By : Amy Watts
Britain’s third-biggest bookmaker, Coral Eurobet is preparing to launch an £800 million flotation and is engaged in extensive talks with an investment bank to sort out the details of the same.
Lehman Brothers are advising Coral on this particular venture according to The Sunday Times.
Charterhouse, the private-equity firm, which had purchased Coral in September 2002 for £860 million, owns 84 percent of the bookmaker while the management including chief executive Vaughn Ashdown and finance director Mick Mariscotti hold the remaining 16 percent of the firm. This works out to about £128 million at the current valuation of Coral.
The company operates around 1,260 betting shops in the UK and if the flotation does become a reality would join online poker groups Party Gaming and Empire Online as the three UK firms to be listed on the stock market.
Analysts say that that management has to be in favor of the flotation as a direct buyout is estimated to be worth somewhere in the region of £2 billion out of which £800 million would be set aside for the equity and remaining £1.2 billion would take care of Coral's outstanding debts. Analysts doubt if any buyer would be interested in pumping such a huge amount into the group. However, the management has not ruled out a direct buyout option.
Since 2002, Coral has moved on rapidly and has made almost £145 million operating profits on the estimated sales of £5.4 billion. Besides, the company runs a very successful Eurobet website. It has also moved in to cash on the rising popularity of online poker. Coral, which was founded in 1926 by Joe Coral, is well placed to make many more acquisitions and a flotation is a perfect platform from which the company can build on.
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Anna Benson to Play Poker on ESPN
Published: 2006-01-30
 Anna Benson, Wife of Orioles Pitcher Kris Benson, Makes Bid to Become Poker Impresario on ESPN
By RICK FREEMAN AP Sports Writer
Jan 30, 2006 (AP)— Anna Benson could find herself getting plenty of face time on ESPN in the coming year. Not during baseball games, but more likely during one of the network's ubiquitous poker broadcasts.
The wife of Orioles pitcher Kris Benson has been polishing her game by playing nearly every day, whether online, on her cell phone or even live and in person. She also recently signed a deal to endorse and promote a fledgling poker Web site.
"I'm still a young little poker player. I've got a long ways to go," Benson said. "It is a thrill to me. They call it a sport now, so it's kind of cool for me to come in and be my own type of an athlete.
"I'm hoping to really amass an empire with this poker. I love to give money away to charities, to change people's lives."
Benson represents a unique kind of endorser she appeals to two unique groups of consumers those who read magazines like Maxim and FHM, and those who follow professional sports.
Benson signed a multiyear deal with Golden Spirit Poker, a company that renamed itself from Golden Spirit Mining and refocused on online gaming. She will link to the Golden Spirit site from her personal Web site, as well as have a site named for her which redirects to Golden Spirit's main site.
She plans to play her first official hand on the site Thursday night. The site lists other casino games as "coming soon" but sports gambling will not be available.
Rich Levin, spokesman for the commissioner's office, declined to comment on Benson's affiliation with Golden Spirit.
Kris Benson was recently traded to Baltimore by the New York Mets. Anna Benson had made comments critical of her husband's teammate, Carlos Delgado, and upset some in the Mets organization by wearing a racy Santa costume to the team's holiday party.
Several months before the World Series of Poker in July, Benson became interested in the game. She entered the series, was eliminated after a few days, but plans to return to Las Vegas this summer a better player.
"I'm going to get schooled on how to play by some of these big-time pros," Benson said. "I want to play well. I'm not trying to do this as a joke, I'm dead serious about playing. I'm not like some bimbo sitting down at a table."
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