Light & Wonder Stock Leaving New York for Sydney

• Slot machine maker’s shares will leave Nasdaq by the end of November
• Move somewhat expected as company had discussed possibility for months

Light & Wonder (NASDAQ: LNW) stock is bidding New York adieu and will transition its sole listing to the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) in Sydney.

The slot machine manufacturer made the announcement in conjunction with its second-quarter earnings report, which it delivered today after the close of US markets. Light & Wonder CEO and President Matt Wilson said the move to a sole Sydney listing could drive shareholder value.

Following an extensive diligence process, I am excited to announce the Board’s decision to transition to a sole ASX listing, which I believe will deliver tremendous shareholder value going forward,” said Wilson in a statement.

Light & Wonder expects that it will delist its shares from the Nasdaq by the end of November. The stock is down 11.31% over the past 12 months, though much of that decline is attributable to an intellectual property legal tussle with rival Aristocrat Leisure. A trial is slated to start next year, though Light & Wonder recently scored a legal win in the case.

Light & Wonder Stock Aussie Move not Surprising

Light & Wonder is more than two years removed from listing its shares in Sydney. That was initially considered a secondary listing, but the Aussie version of the stock has grown to account for 37% of the company’s market value and that stoked speculation a sole ASX listing could be on the horizon.

It’s also the home market to the largest company in the space, Aristocrat Leisure. That’s meaningful because it not only signals Aussie investors’ familiarity with gaming equities, but a willingness to potentially more appropriately value the shares than market participants in other regions. With the transition to a lone Australia listing, L&W could be poised for inclusion in that country’s marquee equity benchmark — a status that would have been hard to attain here in the US.

“With the transition, LNW’s market cap on ASX will move to ~AUD12.2B, making it eligible for the ASX 50,” notes Jefferies analyst David Katz.

The ASX 50 is the most widely observed gauge of Australian equities and fund managers that benchmark to that index have to buy newly included stocks, implying L&W could get a bump when it’s included in it.

L&W to Buy Back Lots of Stock Ahead of ASX Listing

In the second quarter L&W bought back $100 million worth of its own shares, bring the year-to-date total to $266 million or 3.1 million shares. That’s part of a $1 billion share repurchase program announced in June 2024.

That buyback plan was later upped to $1.5 billion, of which $950 million remains. L&W expects to use a significant portion of that $950 million to retire stock prior to delisting from the Nasdaq in November.

“Management currently expects to utilize at least 50% of the available $950 million prior to the delisting,” according to the press release. “Full exhaustion of this $950 million (following the increase) capacity by the end of 2025 would temporarily increase our net debt leverage ratio above the top end of our target range of 2.5x to 3.5x and we expect to return to our target range over the near-term.”