William Hill profits and current trading decline

LONDON (Reuters) - Bookmaker William Hill (WMH.L) reported first-half earnings on Thursday which were in line with its expectations but said it had lost out to more winning punters in the last few weeks, sending its shares lower.

The London-based bookmaker said its profit before finance charges and exceptional items fell by 10 percent to 145.1 million pounds in the 26 weeks to July 1.

The decline reflected costs related to signing up to buy Turf TV's live horseracing feeds and a "disappointing" performance from the group's telephone division.

Gross win increased by 4 percent during the year to 516 million pounds but fell by 1 percent in the four weeks to July 29, which the group said mainly reflected unfavourable results.

Chairman Charles Scott said the group has seen little evidence of the business being impacted by the economic downturn so far.

However, he noted that the business now generates more income from online gaming and betting and from gaming machines and said it is "difficult to predict how these income streams will fare in a continuing adverse economy".

Despite that, William Hill said it remains comfortable with the current range of market expectations. Forecasts for full year pretax profit range between 189 and 223 million pounds, with the consensus at 202 million.

Shares in William Hill were down 4.8 percent to 310-3/4 pence at 9:30 a.m.. They have underperformed the travel & leisure sector .FTASX5750 by 17 percent since the start of the year on concerns over the possible impact of a consumer slowdown.

(Reporting by Matthew Scuffham; Editing by Greg Mahlich)