Loto-Québec President and CEO Jean–François Bergeron has noted his pleasure with the lottery’s first quarter of trading, as total revenues and net income exceeded its pre-pandemic comparatives.

Publishing its Q1 trading report for FY2022/23, Loto-Québec noted that total revenues stood at $744.3m and reported a consolidated net income of $446.6m.

Representing an 85% and 128.1% increase year-over-year respectively, Bergeron was ‘pleased’ with the corporation’s total performance as sales and profitability vastly improved.

He commented: “We’re pleased with our first-quarter results. We’ve exceeded our pre-pandemic levels and are in an excellent position due to tight spending controls, which can be challenging in times of high inflation such as these. These achievements are a result of the remarkable work put in by all our teams.”

Despite this, Loto-Québec disclosed lottery revenues of $256.6m, down $19.2m or 7% from the first quarter of the previous year.

The lottery noted that this was primarily attributed to a decline in sales of Lotto Max. which had ‘exceptional’ comparatives with its run in Q1 of FY2021/22. 

However, improvements made to the lottery’s online channels saw an increase in the proportion of sales made online, with 12.6% of lottery sales coming from online channels compared to just 3.1% in the previous year. 

Moreover, sales from video lottery terminals returned to pre-pandemic comparatives.

Bergeron added: “With these strong financial results, we’re on track to meet our budget target, even though draw-based lottery ticket sales were suspended last week. That said, we’d like to thank the teams who worked so hard to resolve the issues we were experiencing.

“We launched a new phase of our 100% legal campaign to remind people that lotoquebec.com is the only legal casino and sports betting website in Québec. This campaign is part of our brand repositioning strategy and our effort to cement our place in the industry. It also highlights our integrity and our responsible gambling practices, which are a great source of pride for us.”