BitDice Casino Quarterly Report: Q4 2017
Introduction
BitDice Casino’s quarterly report is a new communication tool aimed to provide CSNO token holders with up-to-date information about the company’s major developments and fiscal position.
Along with financial statements, the report will include forward-looking statements and analysis of the past events. It is deemed to increase the company’s transparency and provide token holders with a comforting sense of knowledge regarding the firm’s past, present and future business developments.
Milestones: Accomplishments and Omissions
Re-designing the website
We have started with re-designing the application’s front-end to give it an entirely new authentic look. It became clear to us that adding more games to the line of existing ones, as well as adding new payment methods will be hard to achieve without upgrading the face of the Casino. We have picked up the top web design studio on Behance and are having close communication with them and their illustrators while they are creating a masterpiece, unseen before in the world of online casinos. We want to get a revolutionary idea when it comes to design, and we will stand out from the rest of competitors. The front page development is still in progress, and the static look of it will not be able to express the depth of its animating details — but it looks awesome without a doubt. We would also like to get early feedback from our playing community regarding the new design, so we look forward to hearing from you on all our communication channels (telegram, website, etc.).
Started working on licensing
We have reviewed multiple options for getting the gambling license and decided in favor of Curacao. In our view, Curacao enables the fastest and smoothest way of obtaining the license in the first place to connect other gambling providers which we currently are unable to do. After being able to launch sports betting and the full range of new games with necessary licensing, we are planning to transfer the platform to Malta. We are aware of the trust issues of Curacao, but it remains the fastest and easiest way of establishing licensing presence for the games and for accepting fiat payment methods.
Fighting with faucet farming bots and bonus farmers
Many have noticed the drastic drop of online players from over a 100 down to 30s. Unfortunately, we were forced to disable the majority of employed bonuses as users exploited them. As a result, a big chunk of players, who were receiving the rewards and never contributed real deposits, has disappeared. As we constantly monitored the amount of wager with actual deposits vis-à-vis handout bonuses, we decided to re-assess the implementation of bonuses model, and the level system of players that became outdated due to significant growth of the cryptocurrencies value. We have created a new set of playing mechanics that we will be deploying and testing gradually starting this February.
Moving to Elixir
Our whole platform is written in Ruby language, and we use web socket connection for instant data transmission between player and platform. Although web socket allows for lightning-fast user experience, the Ruby language sets certain limits when it comes to scaling up operations. We have noticed, that the moment we reach 200–300 simultaneous players, the system starts to degrade significantly. To overcome the issue, almost a year ago we initiated first steps to move some parts of the platform engine to Elixir language. Today we’ve got about 60% of the code written in Elixir, and expect the rest to be moved by the end of the 3rd Quarter. The new solution will allow us to handle up to 10 000 simultaneous connections without hurting the platform’s performance. It will become crucial when the platform accommodates new payment methods, and the whole array of new games is introduced. For example, the top companies (William Hill, Bet365) already have their engines running in Erlang/Elixir: https://www.erlang-solutions.com/blog/programming-languages-for-online-betting-an-investigation-of-go-erlang-and-elixir.html
Financial Results Q4 2017
Profitability
In the fourth quarter (1 October — 31 December) of 2017, BitDice Casino earned a net profit of USD 2 161 193,69 or USD 0,02161 per CSNO token.
Net profit from operating activity amounted to USD 1 048 308.
Net realized profit from disposal of some cryptocurrency assets amounted to USD 1 112 885,81.
Distributable profit of 70% amounted to USD 1 512 835,58 or USD 0,01513 per CSNO token (Annualized Dividend Yield of 43,22%)
Product segment overview
A total of USD 206 822 510 was wagered throughout the fourth quarter, with the dice segment being traditionally the strongest, followed by Blackjack and slots.
Q4 2017 wager grew for all cryptocurrencies except BTC, which saw downtick due to abnormally high playing activity in the previous quarters. LiteCoin surprised to the upside due to gaining more traction among cryptocurrencies globally.
Average bet size also continued to growth in USD terms thanks to the appreciation of cryptocurrencies and higher risk appetite among players.
House total revenue reached USD 1 193 245, where USD 769 132 was attributed to Dice segment, USD 384 295 to Blackjack, and USD 39 818 to Slots.
In cryptocurrency terms the revenues for the fourth quarter stood as follow:
Margin wise, the picture was somewhat volatile and deviated from our house edge benchmarks:
On average, Dice segment margin amounted to 0,41%, Blackjack 2,18%, and Slots 2,47%
Running Costs
In the fourth quarter of 2017, BitDice Casino incurred total costs of USD 144 937.
The majority of the cost was attributed to players bonuses payouts, team salaries and website re-designing:
Balance Sheet
At the end of the ICO, dated September 15, 2017, BitDice Casino raised a total of USD 8 748 793,00 in the following cryptocurrency assets:
To minimize risk exposure to cryptocurrency assets and stick to the use of proceeds prescribed in the ICO material, BitDice Casino converted 60% of its crypto assets into USD at the end of the coin offering.
As a result, the fourth quarter began with the following assets sitting on BitDice Casino’s balance sheet, with total equivalent of USD 9 988 312,42:
By the end of the fourth quarter, BitDice Casino’s balance sheet appreciated by 90,83% and amounted to USD 19 060 684,10 in dollar equivalent, largely due to crypto currency gains across the board and a net operating income of USD 1 048 308.
At the end of the fourth quarter, BitDice Casino cut exposure to some of its crypto currency assets to lock in capital gain of USD 1 112 885,81:
At the end of Q4 2017, Client deposits with BitDice Casino amounted to USD 454 060,31 and were as follows:
Distributable Profit
According to BitDice Casino profit distribution policy, every token holder that possesses a balance with value greater than 1 CSNO is entitled to receive quarterly dividend, 70% of the net profit earned pro rata its holding.
As a result of its Q4 2017 economic activity, BitDice Casino earned net operating profit in amount of USD 1 048 308 and net capital gain of USD 1 112 885,81 resulted from disposal of some of it LTC, IOTA and DOGE coins.
Effectively, the total profit of USD 2 161 193,69 is subject to 70% profit sharing among CSNO token holders.
Every token holder is entitled to receive USD 0,01513 per token (1,513 cents per token)
BitDice has made a snapshot of token holders as of Dec 31, 2017 and will distribute the dividends according to the list of CNSO token holders on Dec 31, 2017.
Plans for the Q1 2018
Finalizing the integration of the new API
We prioritize the integration of the new API over the rest of the tasks scheduled for Q1 to be able to expeditiously link all the new games provided by our game integrator. We expect the process to take up to three weeks to complete. Testing will take up a few more days, but ultimately by the end of February, we should be able to launch many new games at once.
Continue to move to Elixir Engine
We will be moving further with converting the platform to Elixir language. In this March, testing of the code is expected to be performed in a closed environment. The process of this transformation is slow and requires a big deal of attention to details. The transformation is extremely important to us for creating the new innovative products, and there are already some exciting ideas on real-time interaction with our players using this new technology.
Acquiring the Curacao License
In the upcoming quarter, we will start the process of acquiring the license, which hopefully will take no more than 4–8 weeks to complete. As soon the necessary paperwork is done, we will be opening banking accounts and connecting payment gateways for accepting fiat deposits. Opening up our platform to fiat players should drastically improve our position among competitors.
Implementing the new design
We expect the new design to be finished in March and deployed on the latest version of the platform running on Elixir. As soon as we move closer to a testing environment, we will start sending out invitations to our clients to try out the new look and share their feedback. Watch out for new announcements and screenshots as we progress and give us your thoughts.
Mobile App
We have decided to postpone the development of a mobile app until the engine of the platform is fully transformed, and the website has got a brand new design.
Roulette & BitAces
BitAces is likely to be added within the upcoming quarter while adding Roulette is highly unlikely due to increased work load related to Elixir transformation and implementation of the new design.
On-site Raffles
Raffles are in the pipeline to be implemented within this quarter on the current version of the website.
Kind regards,
The Team of BitDice Casino
ICO Website: https://ico.bitdice.me/
Casino: https://www.bitdice.me/
Prospectus: https://ico.bitdice.me/prospectus_en.pdf
Twitter: https://twitter.com/bitdice
Bitcointalk: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2047543
Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/BitDiceCasino
