Take-Two reports bookings grew 8% to $784.1M for Q1 2021

Take-Two Interactive reported today that income for its fourth fiscal quarter (initial calendar quarter ended March 31) that beat Wall Street’s expectations, with net bookings of $784.5 million, up 8% from a year ago.

Revenue for the New York video game publisher came in at in at $839.4 million on a GAAP basis, up 10% from $760.5 million a year ago.

The business credited sales of NBA 2K21, Grand Theft Auto V, Grand Theft Auto Online, Red Dead Redemption 2, and Red Dead Online and other current titles for the final results.

Take-Two’s stock value is trading at $166.50 a share, down .71% in following-hours trading.

“They crushed the quarter,” mentioned Michael Pachter, an analyst at Wedbush Securities, in an e-mail to GamesBeat.

But he noted that earnings guidance for the upcoming fiscal year ending March 31, 2022, wasn’t as powerful as some anticipated.

In an analyst get in touch with today, Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick mentioned in a statement, “We delivered record operating results, including net bookings of approximately $3.6 billion and adjusted unrestricted operating cash flow of $920 million. Throughout the year, we enhanced our organization for the long term by broadening our portfolio of offerings, capitalizing on diverse business models, enhancing our infrastructure, and most importantly, investing in our creative talent.”

He didn’t announce any new games, but he mentioned that Take-Two and its labels such as Rockstar, 2K, Social Point, and Private Division have scores of games in the performs.

In November, Take-Two disclosed it bid $973.8 million to getting racing game maker Codemasters. But in December, Electronic Arts announced it bid $1.2 billion for Codemasters, and its offer you was accepted.

Product slate

Take-Two’s Rockstar Games label has create sales to date of 37 million for Red Dead Redemption 2 and 145 million for Grand Theft Auto V.

Of the games in the pipeline, Take-Two mentioned 21 are coming for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2022. Four of these are immersive core releases, which includes two from new franchises and two from current franchises.

The list also involves OlliOlli World from Private Division, a Take-Two label targeted at indie games. Ten upcoming titles are free of charge-to-play mobile games, which includes six from new franchises and 4 from current franchises. There will also be six new iterations of previously released titles.

Altogether, there are 40 more titles coming in the fiscal years ending March 31, 2023, and March 31, 2024. Those contain 19 immersive core releases, seven of which are sports simulation games. Fifteen of these will be out there to obtain, although 4 are free of charge-to-play games. Five are independent titles, 10 are free of charge-to-play mobile games, 4 are mid-core games (3 in sports), and 3 are new iterations of previously released games. That was more detail than Take-Two has supplied prior to about its upcoming release slate.

In a conference get in touch with, Zelnick mentioned that the Firaxis division, the maker of Civilization VI, will reveal two new games later this year.

There are also “massive updates” coming for Red Dead Online and Grand Theft Auto Online this summer season, mentioned Karl Slatoff, president of Take-Two, in an analyst get in touch with.

GAAP net earnings per share was $218.8 million, or $1.88 a share, compared to $122.7 million, or $1.07 a share.

Like other game businesses, Take-Two has benefited from gamers turning to games as a type of relief or distraction in the course of the pandemic.

For the complete year, net bookings have been $3.55 billion, up 19% from a year earlier. GAAP income was $3.37 billion, up from $3.09 billion a year earlier. GAAP net earnings was $588.9 million and earnings per share have been $5.09, compared with net earnings of $404.4 million and earnings per share of $3.54 a share a year earlier.

Outlook

For the initial fiscal quarter (second calendar quarter of 2021) ending June 30, Take-Two mentioned that GAAP income is anticipated to be $730 million to $780 million. Net earnings is anticipated to be $116 million to $129 million, or $1.00 a share to $1.10 a share. Net bookings are anticipated to be $625 million to $675 million.

For the complete year ending March 31, 2022, Take-Two expects income to be $3.14 billion to $3.24 billion. Net earnings is anticipated to be $228 million to $257 million, or $1.95 a share to $2.20 a share. Net bookings are anticipated to be $3.2 billion to $3.3 billion.

Originally appeared on: TheSpuzz