DraftKings valuation down 60% since daily fantasy sports legal scrutiny began

Daily fantasy sports operator DraftKings has seen its valuation plummet by three-fifths since the industry came under closer legal scrutiny, according to a filing by one of its major investors.

In a 10-Q filing with the US Securities Exchange Commission on Tuesday, media conglomerate Twenty-First Century Fox Inc. reported that it had written off around $95m of the $160m stake it had taken in DraftKings – equal to about 11% of the company – in July 2015.

Fox said it had arrived at the nearly 60% devaluation of its stake “based on information concerning DraftKings’ current valuation in a recent financing transaction.” The statement implies that DraftKings was out trying to raise capital at deeply discounted rates from its two funding rounds earlier in 2015, before the roof caved in on the DFS sector.

According to DraftKings’ corporate records, the company’s most recent funding round raised $200m last August, two months before the ‘data leak’ scandal opened up the DFS bad news floodgates. At the time, DraftKings boasted a valuation of around $2b.