Square Enix Drops 15% After ‘Final Fantasy’ and Mobile Setback

Vlad Savov and Takashi Mochizuki, Bloomberg News

Attendees play the Forspoken video game on Sony Group Corp. PlayStation 5 (PS5) video game consoles in the Square Enix Co. booth at the Tokyo Game Show 2022 in Chiba, Japan, on Thursday, Sept. 15, 2022. The show runs through to Sept. 18. Photographer: Kiyoshi Ota/Bloomberg , Bloomberg

(Bloomberg) -- Square Enix Holdings Co. shares suffered their worst intraday drop in almost three years, erasing a little over a year’s worth of gains, after the company reported a 79% decline in operating profit.

Hopes that Final Fantasy XVI would boost sales were dashed by the company’s downbeat earnings report Friday, driving the stock down as much as 15% in Tokyo on Monday. Shares were trading at around ¥5,620 at midday, their lowest since May of last year. Both the Topix Index and MSCI AC Asia Pacific Index were up around 0.3%.

Sales of the latest installment of the long-running role-playing title did not meet the high end of the company’s expectations, Square Enix President Takashi Kiryu told analysts on a post-earnings call Friday, according to three people who attended.

Slow adoption of Sony Group Corp.’s PlayStation 5 was a limiting factor, Kiryu reportedly said. Now that hardware supply constraints have dissipated, Square Enix plans to take steps to boost sales as more people use the PS5, he said. A Square Enix spokesperson declined to comment.

First released in Japan in 1987, Final Fantasy was a pioneer in the fantasy role-playing genre, with the franchise churning out blockbuster after blockbuster in its early years. But momentum has been falling. The game’s latest iteration, which debuted exclusively on the PS5 in June, sold at a much slower pace than its immediate predecessor.

“The Final Fantasy franchise’s profitability is weakening and improvements will take time,” Citigroup analyst Junko Yamamura said in a note to investors.

Tokyo-based Square Enix maintained its fiscal-year forecasts and increased sales by double digits in the first quarter. It has 10 analysts rating its shares a buy, 10 holds and no sell ratings.

“All sub-segments within Games were lower than expected,” Jefferies analyst Atul Goyal wrote in an investor note. He has a hold rating on the stock. “Mobile 1Q revenue (-18% YoY) is a major reason why we have not rated Square Enix as Buy, given the saturation in Japan market and increased competition from the likes of NetEase in Japan.”

(Updates with CEO comment from earnings call Friday)