$Meridian Hldg(MRDN)$ is an $140M online casino and gambling technology small-cap!
Growth is strong, profitability is improving, and debt is decreasing
They are growing across the US, Europe, Africa, Mexico, and Brazil.
Here is $MRDN investment Thesis: 🧵
1/ $MRDN Q2 2026 delivered major improvements.
Revenue: $50.2M +16.1% Y/Y
Gross Profit: $26.9M +10%, margin of 53.5%
ADJ EBITDA: $5.9M +43%, margin of 11.8%
EBIT: $2.4M vs -$2.3M last year
Net Income: $2.2M vs -$3.6M last year
EPS: $0.17 vs -$0.31 last year
2/ $MRDN has 6 core business segments:
1. Meridianbet is the core sports betting and online casino division of the group.
2. R Kings Competitions focuses on prize competitions in the UK and Ireland.
3. Classics provides raffles in Australia to win classic cars.
4. Mexplay is an online casino and sports betting platform in Mexico.
5. GMAG acts as a B2B casino platform and game aggregator, supplying gaming content and infrastructure.
6. Expanse Studios is a B2B game development arm, creating casino games.
Let's expand on each:
3/ Meridianbet is the largest and flagship segment of $MRDN
- $125M revenues in 2025
- 70% Gross Margin
- 428K Players
- 41% Growth in first depositors
- 27% Growth in total deposits
The company offers quite a diverse set of services.
- Online casino
- Online sportsbook
- Small retail casinos
- Retail sports betting locations
The brand is active in Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Malta, Cyprus, Kenya, Tanzania, Nigeria, South Africa, from 2025, Brazil, and others.
4/ R Kings focuses on prize competitions, selling tickets to users, giving them a chance to win rewards like PS5s and Cars.
Its primary market is the UK and Ireland.
The platform made $7.7M in revenue in Q1 2026, a 12% Y/Y increase.
5/ Classics provides raffles in Australia, offering players an opportunity to win classic cars.
- 10,7K VIP Subscriber Players
- 18% Growth in New Users
- Total transactions grew 12%
6/ Mexplay is a $MRDN Mexican online casino and sports betting website. 🇲🇽 🎰 🎲 ⚽
In Q1 2026, the platform now had:
- 74K Player Registrations +271% Y/Y
- 6.1K First depositors +198%
- $61K First deposit value +183%
While Mexplay is a small segment, responsible for just 1.2% of total revenues, it is growing fast and has a large TAM.
Per Spherical Insights, Mexican online gambling is forecast to reach $3.89B by 2033, 4x from 2023.
With the FIFA World Cup just starting in Mexico, this segment will benefit from higher player activity.
In the long term, Mexplay is an important segment as even just a 1% market share could deliver $39M in revenues in 2033.
7/ GMAG acts as a casino platform and game aggregator, supplying gaming content and infrastructure to other businesses.
- Tech backend
- Compliance
- Payments
- Game aggregation and integration
- Customer relationship management
- Marketing tools
8/ Expanse Studios is the game development arm, creating casino games for casinos globally.
Most online casinos rent their games, but $MRDN develops them in-house through Expanse Studios.
- 77 Games
- 6 New Games in Q1 2026
- 1,519 operators using the games
- 15 Countries
- 4 New Countries in Q1 2026
- 156% Growth in players
- 345% Revenue Growth
Now this division is actively expanding into New Jersey and Ontario.
The strategy is quite simple, yet effective. Develop the best games for your own casinos, then offer the same games in regions where you don't operate.
This is the same principle at play, as the Tech Platform Business for $SoFi Technologies Inc.(SOFI)$ .
The first priority of $SOFI
The Tech Platform is that $SOFI has the best banking and fintech software. Then additional value can be generated by offering this tech to other fintechs, in effect having them subsidy you own R&D.
Similarly, the first priority of Expanse is to make great games for Meridian and then sell them in other regions.
9/ Why did $MRDN go public through a merger with Golden Matrix?
Some readers are probably thinking:
Why did MeridianBet owners merge with a much smaller US-based company, mostly for equity?
They were making millions of dollars in profit running online casinos in Southern Europe, so why bother?
I think there are a few reasons.
1) Being a publicly listed US company comes with a certain level of legal, operational, and reputational advantages!
A US company applying for a gaming license or seeking banking, payment processing, or other services will have an easier time than a Serbian one.
2) US is a huge opportunity for the company.
It would be incredibly difficult for a small, private Serbian online casino operator to get a US casino license.
However, a Nasdaq-listed US-headquartered gaming company would have an easier time getting a license.
3) Moreover, being part of a US group enables Meridian to scale by reinvesting earnings at higher returns.
The company now has access to the US capital markets. As they have aggressive expansion plans in both B2B and B2C verticals, new funding will undoubtedly be needed. Now the company can issue new shares to pay for mergers, or raise debt from US funds and banks.
4) Making high profits in the Balkans is great, but it also comes with a ceiling. Equity in a public company gives founders exposure to potentially much larger upside.
Essentially, they are trading steady regional dominance for global opportunity.
The merger was closed in April of 2024, whilst the Brazilian operating license was approved in January of 2025. It could be that the merger with Golden Matrix was a crucial step that helped MeridianBet secure that operating license.
10/ Let's discuss growth opportunities.
First, Africa!
Africa is an often overlooked market, because of the perception of weak growth, yet that isn't the case in all industries.
$MRDN Africa online casino business grew 23% in 2025!
Per the forecast of Astute Analytica, the African gambling market is expected to grow with a 7% CAGR, reaching in 2032 $11.27B!
The company is well-positioned to capture this growth through its exposure to some of the fastest-growing economies in Africa, such as Tanzania, South Africa, Nigeria, and Zambia.
11/ Growth in Mexico
The Mexican Online Gambling Market will grow with a 15.64% CAGR to reach $3.89B in 2033.
MeridianBet entered this market at a perfect moment, just in time for the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
Mexicans love football almost as much as Jesus, and now it is happening in the US, Mexico, and Canada.
In the long term, Mexplay is an important segment as even just a 1% market share could deliver $39M in revenues in 2033.
12/ Growth in Brazil
The Brazilian opportunity is very promising for a small-cap of this size.
Grand View Horizon forecasts that the Brazilian online gambling market will grow with a 12.3% CAGR to reach $3.9B by 2030!
Even a 1% market share would be significant, generating $39M in revenues, compared to around $200M in revenue of today.
However, the potential of this region is now uncertain, as recently the President of Brazil banned online gambling due to Presidential election with the hope of gaining voters. However, this doesn't seem to be working, as Lula is set to lose his reelection.
So, there is a high chance that the new administration will reverse the ban.
13/ US Opportunity
The US is the world’s biggest economy, with the largest and richest middle and upper classes!
Furthermore, the country is currently undergoing a generational transformation, with online gambling getting legalized in more and more states.
The company is deep in the process of acquiring a B2B license in New Jersey.
This would be the first step, the next is to acquire B2B licenses in all states where online casinos are legal, selling Expanse Studios games to thousands of websites and casinos, generating high-margin fee revenue.
14/ Quick back-of-the-napkin $MRDN 2030 Valuation!
- 11% Revenue CAGR
- $313M Revenues
- 14% EBIT Margin
- $44M EBIT
- 30% Interest and Tax
- $31M Net Income
- 15.17M Shares in 2030
- $2.04 EPS
- 15x EPS Multiple
- $30 Share Price
- 161% Upside
These assumptions seem reasonable and achievable, considering the opportunities for growth.
Brazilian and Mexican markets are growing quickly and have high potential, even despite the regulatory uncertainty.
Expanse Studios is creating a new revenue source and reducing costs by developing games in-house.
B2B Expansion in the US and Canada is early.
Plenty of opportunities in Europe for M&A to consolidate and increase market share.
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