Continued strong demand for the latest “Call of Duty,” “StarCraft” and “World of Warcraft” video games helped more than triple Activision Blizzard Inc.’s third-quarter net income and pushed overall results well above Wall Street’s expectations.
The company raised its outlook for the full year on Thursday, though its guidance for the current quarter was more cautious than analysts have been predicting.
“We generally like to take a very thoughtful view about the outlooks we provide,” CEO Bobby Kotick said in an interview. Activision has a history of providing conservative guidance, then beating expectations.
He added that “Call of Duty: Black Ops,” the sequel to the record-shattering “Modern Warfare 2,” should be “one of the biggest launches of the year.” He would not predict whether it’ll outpace its 2009 predecessor. “Black Ops” goes on sale Nov. 9.
For the three months ended Sept. 30, Activision earned $51 million, or 4 cents per share. This is up from $15 million, or 1 cent per share, a year earlier.
Revenue climbed 6 percent to $745 million from $703 million.
The company’s adjusted earnings of 12 cents per share handily surpassed Wall Street’s estimates of 9 cents per share.
After adjustments to account for deferred revenue and costs related to games with online components, revenue was $857 million. On this basis, analysts polled by Thomson Reuters were expecting much lower revenue of $750 million.
For the current quarter, which is the video game industry’s most lucrative period of the year, the company forecast adjusted earnings of 47 cents per share on revenue of $2.2 billion. Analysts have been expecting slightly higher results — earnings of 50 cents per share and revenue of $2.31 billion.
Activision, which is based in Santa Monica, Calif., did raise its full year guidance. The company now expects adjusted earnings of 74 cents per share on revenue of $4.45…