Shares in Paddy Power-owner Flutter surge 6% as it bets on €3.5bn purchase of US bookmaker

The Stars takeover gave Flutter ownership of Fox Bet, a Stars unit that has an exclusive license to use trademarks of Rupert Murdoch’s Fox Corp.

Paddy Power-owner Flutter Entertainment said it’s buying most of the remaining shares in FanDuel for $4.2bn (€3.5bn) to get almost full ownership of the fast-growing US bookmaker. Flutter shares rose as much as 14% to a record high.

Flutter will pay almost $2.1bn in cash and issue about 11.7 million new Flutter shares to FanDuuel-owner Fastball under the conditional agreement, taking its stake in FanDuel to 95% from almost 58%. The deal gives FanDuel an estimated enterprise value of $11.2bn.