Playtika Holding Corp. (NASDAQ:PLTK) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Craig Abrahams: Thanks Drew. So, in terms of our priorities, we’re consistent with what we’ve said in the past and that M&A continues to be a priority for us in terms of adding franchises to our portfolio. If you look at our nine titles in the top 100 in 2022, seven of them came through M&A. So that continues to be for us the means to which we want to bring titles onto the portfolio. In terms of leverage, historically we’ve said that one to three times net leverage is our target range. But for the right M&A opportunity we’d consider going above that. But that’s our public comments in the past and nothing’s changed there from management’s perspective. And then lastly in terms of direct-to-consumer, we continue to have that 30% target. We are adding two new titles onto the D2C platform in 2023. And so as we add titles into the casual portfolio on the D2C platform, we hope to see continued progression there.

Drew Crum: And Craig, sorry, what are those two new titles?

Craig Abrahams: Yeah. Junes journey and Solitaire Grand Harvest.

Drew Crum: Got it. Okay. Thanks guys.

Operator: Thank you. Our next question comes from Omar Dessouky with Bank of America. You may proceed.

Omar Dessouky: Hi. Thanks for taking my question. Shortly after your third quarter call you released an 8-K that showed that you were lowering your performance stock unit invest in thresholds. So, for example, previously the 50% threshold was 6% growth for 2023 to 2025 within each year. And then subsequently it was 1% growth. And I just wanted to know was there any reason that investors should not take that as some sign of your confidence in 2024 and 2025 growth of revenue.

Craig Abrahams: Hey, Omar, thanks for the question. We’re not going to comment further on decisions made by the Board in terms of the compensation committee. What I would say is that the market today is more challenging than it was just a few years ago in terms of growth for the overall market. That being said, as we mentioned earlier on the call, we have seen over the last few months continued positive progression.

Omar Dessouky: Okay. And if I could just ask one follow-up on a different topic. Maybe since you guys are the experts and you see so many games across the industry, can you give us a sense of just thinking game-theory here, what’s the end game for the mobile gaming market? Is this a market that we’ll see a lot of exits in a couple of years if things don’t turn around on the marketing side and the user acquisition side, or should we think that all of these smaller studios and smaller games will be acquired, I guess how does competition eventually play-in? And what happens to capital in this industry over the next, I would say two to three years? Is it an extinction event, or is it just going to be consolidation, or will simply smaller studios just accept low returns on capital?

Robert Antokol: Thanks. So we see mobile as the dominant form factor for video gaming going forward. I mean, if you look at people today everyone has a phone in their hand, children have phones in their hand as everyone gets older that’s going to be the device they use to communicate with, play games with and conduct commerce with. So I think as we look at the fact that we have nine titles in the top 100 that we continue to grow our market share in the mobile gaming market. Our view is that it’s going to continue to be a highly strategic asset owning mobile games and owning market share within the top grossing apps in the App Store. So I think there will be continued consolidation just given how difficult it is to launch mobile franchises at scale today. And so those that have long-lasting franchises with great brands, we’ll continue to have real value.