Sony Corp (SNE) stock is down over 3% between November 12 and November 16 on a list of new announcements from the company. Sony’s stock is still performing well in 2018, up over 11% year-to-date, but has come under pressure in the last week.
The biggest shock for the company came on Thursday when Sony made the announcement that they will be skipping E3 next year. The E3 video game event is the largest in the world, and PlayStation 4 remains the world’s most popular game console, breaking the 500-million-units-sold mark.
PlayStation, Sony’s video game branch, will skip the event for the first time since 1995. The company also skipped their own annual fan conference this year due to the company claiming that there was a lack of major announcements to warrant the event.
The Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) event will lose a major sponsor in Sony if the company skips the event.
Industry insiders have been speculating that the company would miss the event since no official quotes from the company made it into the E3 announcement.
The 2019 year is looking to be a slow one for the company, with few exclusive titles coming to the console in the coming year. This may be one of the reasons that the company has pulled out of the event.
Sony’s discussion with Game Informer on the matter confirms that the company will not attend E3, but Sony does claim that they’re looking at new avenues to engage the community in 2019. Sony may be working on ways to hold virtual events in 2019, but the company does claim that they will share their plans with fans that have been loyal to the console since 1995.
Sony isn’t just a gaming brand, but a worldwide electronic leader and music brand, too.
The company announced earlier in the week that they have completed the acquisition of EMI Music Publishing, a move that was highly debated by Indie records. The acquisition will merge the company into the Sony/ATV brand, increasing the Sony/ATV brand’s revenue from $610 million to over $1.275 billion, with EMI Music contributing $663 million in revenue per year.
EU regulators greenlighted the approval weeks ago despite backlash from the music and indie industry. Sony is said to have paid around $4.31 billion in total over the years for their stake in the company.
The company’s entertainment unit is also soaring, helping Sony reach record profits. The unit had everything from a phone headset for business professionals to television, headphones, home theater systems, accessories and other electronics.
Sony’s gaming unit has helped the company the most in 2018, leading Sony to boost its profit expectations up 30% from estimates in July. The company expects annual profits to hit $7.7 billion thanks to strong revenue growth in its gaming division in the second-quarter.
God of War and Spider-Man, two of the bestselling games on the PlayStation console, helped drive sales higher. The gaming market was said to be less competitive than the home entertainment business, which has been under pricing pressure over the last decade. The company’s mobile division continues to face challenges which have been offset by the company’s movie and music units.
Sony has been working to strengthen their gaming unit in recent weeks, offering an update that fixes many of the noise problems that the console faced two weeks ago. The company’s most recent earnings release shows that PlayStation sales continue to grow as profits for the quarter hit $2.1 billion. Sony Pictures profits for the fiscal second-quarter of the year hit $211 million, further boosting the company’s bottom line heading into the end of the
