What happened
Shares of International Game Technology (IGT -1.36%) were rising 6.5% higher heading into midday trading Monday, after the gaming company announced it was selling its Italian business-to-consumer gaming machine, sports betting, and digital gaming businesses to Apollo Global Management for $1.15 billion.
So what
IGT, which provides gaming experiences in physical and digital form, whether it's gaming machines, lotteries, or sports betting, is planning on focusing on the business-to-business segment of the market that it knows especially well.
Image source: Getty Images.
It will sell the share capital of the Italian businesses of Lottomatica Videolot Rete and Lottomatica Scommesse to Gamenet Group, a subsidiary of Apollo.
Now what
IGT is going back to basics and continuing to streamline its business to save money. The sale should help improve the gaming company's profits, and it ought to eliminate the drag that the tax and regulatory policies of Italy caused for IGT. For example, Italy imposed a value-added tax at the start of 2020.
IGT routinely highlighted its business in Italy as an enduring risk factor for the tech stock's performance.
