Light & Wonder Inc (ASX: LNW) shares have taken a beating this week.
In afternoon trade on Friday, the gaming technology company's shares are down 4% to $127.53.
This means that its shares are now down 12% over the past two trading sessions.
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Why are Light & Wonder shares under pressure?
The catalyst for this selling has been the release of a quarterly update that fell short of expectations.
The team at Macquarie Group Ltd (ASX: MQG) has been running the rule over the result. It was disappointed with its top line performance, but was pleased to see margin improvements. The broker said:
Light & Wonder reported US$311m 1Q25 AEBITDA, +11% yoy albeit US $3m / 1% below Visible Alpha consensus (US$314m) and free-cash-flow saw +19% yoy growth. Overall, revenues missed expectations, but better-than-expected (and sustainably higher) margins across the businesses boosted the result.
Macquarie also acknowledges that there are some risks to the company achieving its AEBITDA targets this year. It adds:
Some trends in the 1Q25 result, in particular Gaming (sequential outright volumes & fee per day) and Social casino (sequential margins), bring caution around delivering the US$1.4bn 2025 AEBITDA guide, excl. Grover Gaming which implies +12% yoy growth (MQe = +11%, with +7% 1H / +15% 2H growth).
Look forward, near-term visibility is lower than usual, and whilst we preface casino gaming as robust, the frequency of US policy changes bring risks to consumer sentiment and casino capital budgets; whilst tariffs on components for manufacturing slot machines are expected to be largely mitigated, there is likely to be a modest impact.
Is this weakness a buying opportunity?
Despite the above, the team at Macquarie thinks that investors should be taking advantage of this weakness to buy Light & Wonder shares while they are down in the dumps.
This morning, the broker has reaffirmed its outperform rating with a trimmed price target of $187.00. Based on its current share price, this implies potential upside of almost 47% for investors over the next 12 months.
Macquarie then concludes:
Light & Wonder's growth trajectory is choppy, not linear in 2025, and we have become slightly cautious on the 2025 guidance, sitting US$18m / 1% below (previously in line). The upcoming investor day is a catalyst (expect multi-year guide), but 2Q25 trends are equally important given low visibility.
Overall, this beaten down stock could be worth considering if you're in the market for new investments.
