- FOX Bet was shuttered in 2023
- Media company has option to acquire 18.6% of FanDuel
- It also owns $900 million worth of Flutter Entertainment equity
Fox Corporation (NASDAQ: FOX) is one of the biggest names in US sports broadcasting and streaming, but it’s not looking to leverage that positioning to get back into the world of sports wagering.
At UBS’ 2025 Global Media and Communications Conference on Monday, CFO Steven Tomsic said the media behemoth isn’t eyeing a return to sports betting. In July 2023, News Corp (NASDAQ: NWSA) and Flutter Entertainment (NYSE: FLUT) scrapped FOX Bet, which the latter came to control via its 2020 acquisition of the Stars Group.
Through Flutter’s acquisition of Star, Fox became an investor in the gaming entity and now owns 2.5% of the FanDuel parent. Tomsic said at the UBS conference that stake is worth $900 million.
The 2023 demise of FOX Bet wasn’t surprising. For years prior, Flutter made no secret of prioritizing FanDuel while letting FOX Bet languish. The media company still has rights to FOX Bet branding.
Fox Content to Be Sports Betting Investor
Soon after FOX Bet met its end, rumors surfaced the broadcast giant was looking to resuscitate the business and was in talks with other gaming companies to that effect. Nothing panned out. Fast-forward to 2025 and it appears as though Fox is content to be a sports betting investor.
We have enormous respect for what Flutter brings to the table in terms of sports betting prowess,” said Tomsic at the UBS conference. “We’re happy as a sports business to bring the sports broadcasting element to it.”
Fox may be wise to stay out of sports betting. In the US, it’s an ultra-competitive industry in which nearly all entrants have had difficulty threatening the DraftKings/FanDuel duopoly. The US sports betting graveyard is littered with a slew of operators, including some with well-known brands, that threw in the towel because they couldn’t gain adequate market share.
Such efforts are costly and Fox may be better off conserving cash to firm its balance sheet while growing other high-performing businesses. On a related note, Tomsic said the company isn’t actively pursuing mergers and acquisitions over the near-term.
Fox Still Has Sports Betting Exposure
While Fox isn’t directly engaged in either the business-to-business or consumer-facing sides of the sports wagering industry, it has exposure to the latter by way of its option to acquire 18.6% of FanDuel. The media entity can exercise those rights through 2030.
Fox previously valued FanDuel at $35 billion, meaning it believes 18.6% is worth $6.5 billion. However, the July transaction in which Flutter acquired the 5% of FanDuel it didn’t from FanDuel implied at the time the sportsbook is worth $31 billion, or $4 billion less than Fox’s estimate.
Still, the rights to acquire 18.6% of FanDuel position Fox to benefit from sports betting growth without having to directly participate in the industry.
The post Fox Not Looking to Get Into Sports Betting, Says CFO Tomsic appeared first on Casino.org.
