New “Call of Duty” on Way to $1 Billion in Sales (ATVI, GME)
To call the new mega-hit game “Call of Duty: Black Ops” a success would be the understatement of 2010 in video games. Activision Blizzard, Inc. (NASDAQ: ATVI) has set a record in sales and been given much gamer praise. The…
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Here is the thing to consider. “Call of Duty: Black Ops” was not only a record in-store video game debut sales. It is a record for box office sales, online video game sales, apps, and other media sales. Selling a game for $59.95 a pop and having a mega-hit can pass most forms of media when you consider a movie average now around $10.00 plus or minus a bit in most cities. This is a call of duty to gamers. When you consider that Black Friday is on the way and the praised Christmas and holiday season is around the corner, this game launch has a shot at being a $1 billion game even before the end of calendar-2010.
Activision Blizzard’s total 2009 revenues were $4.279 billion, and Thomson Reuters has estimates of only $4.55 billion for all of 2010 and $4.71 billion for all of 2011. The company is also advertising and accepting orders for Blizzard’s WoW expansion set game called “World of WarCraft: Cataclysm” which is due to be released on December 7, 2010. Master Chief and the glorious Halo franchise feel so yesterday at the moment.
GameStop posted less than a 5% gain and shares have been fighting over the positive and negative line all morning after its earnings. Shares are currently down 0.2% at $20.96 and shares had been at $22.00 briefly yesterday for what was very briefly the highest share price going all the way back to June.
Activision Blizzard shares are up 1.1% at $11.75. So far the “Call of Duty: Black Ops” release has not added major gains to the stock.
JON C. OGG
Contact [email protected] for any questions or corrections.
Jon Ogg has been a financial news analyst since 1997. Mr. Ogg set up one of the first audio squawk box services for traders called TTN, which he sold in 2003. He has previously worked as a licensed broker to some of the top U.S. and E.U. financial institutions, managed capital, and has raised private capital at the seed and venture stage. He has lived in Copenhagen, Denmark, as well as New York and Chicago, and he now lives in Houston, Texas. Jon received a Bachelor of Business Administration in finance at University of Houston in 1992. www.247wallst.com.
