FILE - A traveler walks past an advertisement featuring a Nintendo character at Narita airport in Narita near Tokyo, on June 10, 2022. (AP Photo/Shuji Kajiyama, File)
TOKYO (AP) – Japanese video game maker Nintendo reported Friday a 55% drop in profit in the April-June quarter as sales slipped in both machines and game software compared to last year.
Game machine sales tend to trail off after they hit the market. The Nintendo Switch is in its eighth year after sales began, with more than 140 million already sold.
Profit at Nintendo Co., owner of the Super Mario and Pokemon franchises, totaled 80.95 billion yen ($543 million) in the last quarter, down from 181 billion yen a year earlier. Quarterly sales declined 46.5% to 246.6 billion yen ($1.7 billion).
Nintendo did not release any new information about a promised Switch successor. Earlier this year, its president, Shuntaro Furukawa, said an announcement will be made before April 2025.
There’s an estimated 128 million Switch players around the world. Quarterly sales of the Switch machine for the latest period fell 46% year-on-year to 2.1 million machines from 3.9 million.
Software sales declined 41%, despite million-seller games including a take on the Super Mario series called “Paper Mario,” and a new Luigi game.
Nintendo said the declines in sales and profit reflected especially strong results last year, when they got a powerful boost from a Super Mario Brothers movie. Nintendo stressed that its recent profits and sales, which were in line with analysts’ forecasts, were comparable to what it racked up January-March.
Another Super Mario film is promised for 2026, as Nintendo leans on its prized intellectual property to keep its business rolling.
The latest in the Mario Party, Donkey Kong and Zelda series is being promised for the next several months.
“Other software publishers also plan to release a wide variety of titles, and we will strive to invigorate the platform by continually introducing new titles in addition to the existing titles,” Nintendo said.
The company vowed to keep wooing people to its games. Later this year the Nintendo Museum will open in Japan’s ancient capital of Kyoto, where the company is based. A Nintendo store is due to open in San Francisco’s Union Square next year.
Nintendo stocks dropped 2.3% in Tokyo trading, shortly before earnings were announced. The overall Nikkei benchmark plunged 5.8% on Friday.
Nintendo’s shares have recent fallen as the U.S. dollar has weakened against the yen, trading at about 149 yen. It had earlier cost above 160 yen. A weak yen is a plus for exporters like Nintendo because it boosts the value of their overseas earnings.
Nintendo kept its profit forecast for the year through March at 300 billion yen ($2 billion).
___
Yuri Kageyama is at X: https://x.com/yurikageyama
