Daily fantasy sports operator Fantasy Aces has announced it completed the acquisition of users from another DFS site, Fantasy Feud.
The move was the completion of a deal that was originally announced in August.
Both DFS sites are/were publicly traded companies on the Canadian TSX Venture Exchange. Feud was under the umbrella of the larger Gaming Nation.
The Aces-Feud deal, done
According to a press release, Fantasy Aces announced “acquisition of certain active daily fantasy sports participants in the database of Fantasy Feud.” The purchase price was C$454,250 (C$25,000 in cash and the rest in stock).
Under the original agreement, Aces got access to 35,000 participants that used the Feud platform. It had agreed to pay for any unique users that the two sites did not share.
Fantasy Aces also announced it will begin trading on the OTCQB, a U.S.-based stock exchange, under the symbol FASDF. It also continues to be listed on TSX.
Tom Frisina, CEO of Fantasy Aces, in a press release:
“As our business continues to expand, it is important that our visibility follows suit. We are pleased with our progress to date and we’re at an important inflection point to generating substantially more revenue over the coming quarters. We therefore felt it was necessary to expand our investor audience in a market that understands the scope of our business.”
“The closing of the acquisition from Gaming Nation is an important milestone for us and the additional active participants will make an important contribution to our future revenue stream.”
Fantasy Aces’ stock price ticked up to just under seven cents a share on Tuesday morning.
Fantasy Feud no more
The move marks the official end of Feud, for which Gaming Nation had big plans just more than a year ago.
The Fantasy Feud domain now says the two sites have merged, and directs players to the Fantasy Aces platform.
The merger of the two sites sees the players of Feud migrated to Aces, with the former’s software platform being retired.
The market position for Fantasy Aces
Fantasy Aces offers a salary-cap style DFS game much like market leaders DraftKings and FanDuel.
Yahoo’s DFS platform is currently a solid but distant No. 3 behind the “big two” of DFS. That leaves Fantasy Aces in the tier of competitors vying for meaningful marketshare. That includes FantasyDraft, another salary-cap style site.
By way of comparison, Aces’ big NFL contest for the upcoming week is a $40,000 guaranteed prize pool; FantasyDraft’s is $60,000. Other companies that offer variants on the core DFS experience like Draft and Boom Fantasy are also eyeing growth in the space.
The environment for growth continues to be difficult, especially for smaller DFS sites. All companies in the space are running up against the prospects of regulation, fees and taxation in a variety of states.
Meanwhile, the prospects of a DraftKings-FanDuel merger that had been termed as “imminent” in October still hangs over the industry’s head. That will alter the landscape for Fantasy Aces and everyone in the DFS space, if and when it happens.
