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Estoril Sol closed 2025 with a loss of €25.3m, more than double the €12.1m deficit it recorded a year earlier. The Portuguese casino operator, majority owned by Sociedade de Turismo e Diversões de Macau (STDM), the Macau gaming group founded by the late Stanley Ho, published its annual accounts only after three delays.
Two items explain most of the deterioration: the expiry of the Casino Póvoa concession, which led the group to set aside around €18m for restructuring, and a Supreme Administrative Court ruling that confirmed a €36.9m payment obligation to the Portuguese State. Online gaming, now the group’s main earnings driver, grew revenue by 3% compared with 2024.
Póvoa exit reshapes the group
Estoril Sol runs two casinos, in Estoril and Lisbon, under concessions that extend to 2037. For recent decades it also operated Casino Póvoa in Póvoa de Varzim, northern Portugal, through its subsidiary Varzim Sol.
That arrangement ended with the public tender for the concession. Estoril Sol chose not to submit a bid before the 29 December deadline, and the licence went to French operator Barrière. Casino Póvoa was the smallest of the group’s three properties, but its exit has a structural impact on the group.
The €18m provision covers labour costs, corporate restructuring and operational adjustments tied to the withdrawal. The scale of that charge was one of the main reasons the company postponed presenting its 2025 accounts three times.
The charge also places Estoril Sol on a growing list of gambling companies paying for heavy restructuring this year, alongside the job cuts recorded across the sector in 2026.
Court confirms €36.9m liability
The year brought a separate legal defeat. Portugal’s Supreme Administrative Court upheld a ruling that requires Estoril Sol to pay €36.9m to the State. The dispute stems from a corporate restructuring process carried out several years ago, and the company continues to challenge the decision.
Until that challenge is resolved, the confirmed ruling sits on a balance sheet already weakened by two consecutive years of losses. The company has not indicated when a final decision might arrive.
Online grows, but slower than the market
Online gaming remained the group’s most consistent segment, with revenue up 3% on 2024. The land-based operations in Estoril and Lisbon had a more difficult year, leaving online as the group’s main earnings driver.
That 3% growth came in well below the pace of the wider market. Portugal’s online gambling sector generated €1.21bn in GGR in 2025, and online revenue rose 13.7% year on year to €323.7m in the first quarter of 2026. On those numbers, Estoril Sol’s online operation is growing more slowly than its licensed competitors, even as it remains the group’s most important earnings source.
Equity position sets the agenda
Estoril Sol enters 2026 as a two-casino operator with concessions secured until 2037, an online business growing below market pace, and two financial overhangs: the restructuring bill from the Póvoa exit and the contested €36.9m payment to the State.
The accounts set out the priorities: strengthen the equity position and reverse losses that have widened for two consecutive years. How fast that happens depends on how quickly the Póvoa restructuring costs are absorbed, whether online growth picks up, and the outcome of the company’s challenge to the €36.9m ruling. The concessions in Estoril and Lisbon give the group time until 2037; the balance sheet gives it much less.
Source: Estoril Sol
