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Aristocrat chops U.S. management
SYDNEY, Australia (CNN) -- Australian gaming equipment maker Aristocrat Leisure removed its U.S. management team Monday as it struggles to turn around a poor performance in the Americas. Chairman John Ducker and CEO Des Randall said three executives of U.S. subsidiary Aristocrat Technologies Inc (ATI) would leave this month. They are ATI president Mark Newburg and chief financial officer Ron Rowan -- both of whom will finish on Friday -- and vice president of sales David Lucchese, who will leave later in the month. Randall will assume management responsibility for Aristocrat's Americas business for the time being. Key shareholders have been calling for changes to the Aristocrat board and management since its share price started to slide last month. Aristocrat shocked the market early in February when it announced that it had lost a key South American contract for 3,000 electronic gaming machines, and followed that with a warning that its North American operations were trading below expectations. (Full story) It cuts its net profit target by Aust. $28 million (about $17 million), prompting a selloff that cut its market capitalization by more than A$1 billion. On February 18 Aristocrat revealed a 7 percent fall in full-year net profit to A$80.2 million ($47.3 million) and confirmed it was being investigated by Australia's corporate watchdog, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), over its profit warning. In a statement to the Australian Stock Exchange on Monday, Aristocrat said a special board meeting later this month will review its Americas business. Shares in Aristocrat closed 1.12 percent lower Monday at A$1.76. The shares have lost more than 62 percent of their value so far this year. Its shareholders include Perpetual Trustees with 8.5 percent, AMP with 5.2 percent and the founding Ainsworth family with about 40 percent.
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