Earnings: THQ Bombs, $35.3 Million Loss For 08
This story was written by James Quintana Pearce.
THQ reported net $1,030.5 million for the 12 months ending March 31 2008, a slight increase on the $1,026.9 million in sales the previous year (and the companies 13th consecutive year of growth). However, THQ reported a net loss of $35.3 million, or $0.53 per share compared to a net income of $68.0 million, or $1.01 per diluted share in fiscal 2007. THQ President and CEO Brian Farrell said that the company has three key initiatives to improve matters in 2009: A stronger slate of products; initiatives to improve product quality and competitiveness, and a change in cost structure to "generate significant operating leverage". THQ projects net sales of between $1,175 million to $1,200 million for the next fiscal year, with operating margins "in the high single digits".
Q1
For the first quarter of 2008 THQ reported net sales of $187.0 million, up from $172.1 million a year earlier. However, there was weaker-than-expected sell through of some of its previously released titles, which resulted in greater-than-anticipated price protection and reserves, as well as increased software amortization expense during the quarter. Therefore, THQ had a net loss of $34.5 million or $0.52 per share for the quarter, compared to a net income of $6.5 million or $0.09 per share a year ago. For the next quarter THQ expects net sales of $115-125 million and net loss per share of $0.38 to $0.42 due to a weak product release schedule.
In specific-game news, lifetime shipments of THQ's games based on Nickelodeon and WWE each surpassed $1 billion.
Mobile:
The percentage of THQ's revenues that came from mobile games fell from 2.6 percent in 2007 to 1.9 percent in 2008. For the first quarter mobile made up 2.8 percent of THQ's revenues, up from 2.5 percent a year ago.
By James Quintana Pearce