Controversial Bonus Payouts for Bwin Executives

Bwin.party digital entertainment has received criticism over their newly implemented bonus plans for top executive staff members.

Gambling news outlets reported that apparently controversial bonus plans were approved as the company’s share price had fallen so suddenly that existing benchmarks for judging how much to top up the execs’ annual pay packets were redundant.

However, the bonuses were met with objections by almost a third of Bwin shareholders, who felt executives should not be rewarded when the company’s market cap had shrunk nearly 40%.

Regardless, CEO Norbert Teufelberger was awarded 560,254 shares (at £1.27 per share) under the company’s Bonus Banking Plan (BBP) and a further 806,405 shares under the Incentive Plan (BIP), making a total bonus of £1.735m.

CFO Martin Weigold was awarded 405,828 shares under the BBP and 539,485 shares under the BIP.

Non-executive director Manfred Bodner was awarded 441,543 shares under the BBP.

William Interactive Content Deal

In other Bwin news, the company has agreed on a content deal with Williams Interactive, the online offshoot of WMS Industries.

The deal will see Williams Interactive integrate its Remote Game Server into the Bwin.party platform, allowing players in Europe and New Jersey to access Williams’ full range of slots titles and casino game engines.

Williams Interactive recently struck a similar deal with Gamesys in New Jersey.

Bwin is also looking to consolidate its online poker sites in France and Italy by shifting off the Ongame network and onto the PartyPoker platform.

Ongame was sold to the Amaya Gaming Group in 2012 and moved its dot-com businesses to PartyPoker; regional markets remained on Ongame.