GAN Shares Hit Jackpot as Company Unveils Restructuring Targeting NASDAQ Listing

Posted on: March 3, 2020, 12:03h. 

Last updated on: March 3, 2020, 01:23h.

Todd Shriber @etfgodfather Read More
Expertise: Financial, Gaming Business, Mergers and Acquisitions.

GAN Plc, the gaming publisher and systems supplier, saw its London-listed and over-the-counter (OTC) shares surge Tuesday after the company revealed a corporate restructuring that includes bringing its stock to the NASDAQ.

GAN shares soared after the company said it’s moving closer to a NASDAQ listing. (Image: CNBC)

GAN UK and affiliated firms will be folded into GAN Bermuda, with investors receiving one share in the new, NASDAQ-listed entity for every four shares of the original company that they currently own. The company said the share consolidation is necessary to meet the US exchange’s listing requirements.

GAN selected NASDAQ as its listing venue given its reputation for bringing together the world’s leading software-as-a-service (“SaaS”) companies, increasing exposure within the investment community while requiring compliance with higher governance standards and providing investors and clients with greater transparency of GAN plc’s business,” according to a company filing with the London Stock Exchange (LSE).

GAN’s US-listed stock currently trades OTC under the ticker “GMMNF” and is higher by 15.34 percent at this writing on a day when gaming stocks are being punished. An array of foreign companies, including several with gaming industry footprints, trade OTC in the US to lower listing costs.

A Big Deal

In the financial community, listings on the NASDAQ or New York Stock Exchange are viewed with an element of prestige. But there are benefits to the companies doing that beyond the superficial.

In the case of GAN, the stock could become part of the NASDAQ Composite Index, a broad collection of companies trading on that exchange. With that, fund managers that benchmark to that gauge would have to buy GAN equity to stay inline with the index.

Looking further out, if GAN’s US-listed stock appreciates, it could eventually join the NASDAQ-100 Index (NDX), a barometer of that exchange’s 100 largest companies by market capitalization and one of the most widely followed equity benchmarks in the world.

Sensible Listing Venue

GAN, which claims it has published more content for gaming manufacturers than any other firm, protects intellectual property for the likes of Aristocrat, Everi Holdings Konami, Ainsworth, and Incredible Technologies, among others.

While GAN may be viewed as a gaming company, it is positioning itself as a technology firm – one that generates the bulk of its revenue in the US via clients such as Ocean Resort in Atlantic City, N.J. and Parx Casino in Pennsylvania.

“GAN UK derives the substantial majority of revenues from the US, which remains the key geographic market opportunity for future growth,” said the company in the LSE filing. “The US equity capital markets consist of a large number of publicly-listed SaaS companies, and investors that are familiar with enterprise SaaS solutions, providing access to capital at reduced cost.”

NASDAQ is home to a slew of SaaS companies, including Workday, Inc. (NASDAQ:WDAY), Okta, Inc. (NASDAQ:OKTA) and The Trade Desk, Inc. (NASDAQ:TTD).

What’s SaaS?

Software-as-a-service, or SaaS, describes a delivery methodology where companies provide products and services on a subscription basis rather than the old way of procuring new software, which meant acquiring new hardware.

SaaS, also known as “on-demand software,” is centrally hosted via the cloud and is accessible for end users via the internet. An SaaS provider, such as GAN or any of the aforementioned non-gaming companies, will typically configure their offerings as “private only” access so only paying clients can use the products.

SaaS is increasingly popular with businesses because it’s more cost-effective than traditional software procurement, which usually requires that a new license be purchased for each work station. Additionally, on demand software reduces implementation costs and time consumption.