Why Penn National Gaming Plunged 21% Today

Shares of Penn National Gaming (NASDAQ: PENN) tumbled to the tune of 21.1% on Thursday after the company reported third-quarter earnings that fell short of expectations. Bolstering today's selling may be reports that Barstool Sports' front man David Portnoy engaged in violent -- though not non-consensual -- sex. Penn is not only a 36% stakeholder in Barstool sports, but is building Barstool-branded sports bars and sports-betting books in many of its casinos.

For the third quarter of 2021 ending in September, Penn National Gaming earned $0.52 per share on $1.51 billion in revenue. The top line improved on year-ago sales of $1.13 billion, although profits peeled back from Q3 2020's per-share profits of $0.93.

More damaging was the earnings miss. While Penn's revenue was in line with analyst expectations, those same analysts were expecting a bottom line of between $0.85 and $0.89 per share, depending on the source. The official report from the company suggested Hurricane Ida and the spread of the delta variant of the coronavirus made an impact on last quarter's results.

Source Fool.com