Activision’s New High Score Includes Record Revenue and Profit in Q3

Activision said it achieved record revenue in the third quarter, reporting $841 million, up from $754 million in the same period a year earlier. The videogame maker also delivered record earnings per share of 20 cents, as compared to the third quarter a year earlier.

The results easily beat the Santa Monica company’s outlook, which was hoping to achieve six cents a share on revenue of $740 million. The results also beat analyst expectations, which are better to compare against the company’s non-GAAP earnings. Based on those calculations, which exclude some results, Activision reported 15 cents per share in profit on revenue of $751 million. That literally blows away analyst expectations, which were projecting eight cents per share in profit on revenue of $708 million.

The company’s forecasts are typically conservative, but in the release, CEO Bobby Kotick attributed the strong results to subscription sales of Blizzard’s World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria, Diablo II; Skylanders Spryro’s Adventure; and sales for its Call of Duty franchise.

Thanks to today’s strong performance, the company is raising its full-year guidance for the third time in 2012. The new revision calls for GAAP earnings of 88 cents a share on revenue of $4.57 billion. Previously, it was expecting a profit of 69 cents a share on revenue of $4.3 billion.

Kotick still cautioned investors about next year, warning that it continues to be a challenging global economy and that it will be extremely hard to beat this year’s performance given record-shattering sales of Diablo III. “We expect that over the long-term, we will maintain our leadership position as the world’s leading interactive entertainment company and continue to provide strong returns to our shareholders by delivering great games to audiences around the world,” he said.

Latest Video

View all videos »

Search »

I’m a giant vat of creative juices.

— David Pogue on why he’s joining Yahoo