Nintendo beats EA in market value stakes

Games industry analyst DFC Intelligence has released a new report which states that the total market value of leading games companies increased by 7 per cent over the course of last year.

DFC looked at company growth between February and December 2005 and found that of the "big three", Nintendo experienced the largest increase in market value - which rose by 15 per cent to USD 18.6 billion. Sony and Microsoft saw an increase of 7 and 1 per cent respectively.

Things aren't looking so good for Electronic Arts, however - the publishing giant's market value fell by 17 per cent over the course of the year, dropping from USD 19.4 billion to USD 16.2 billion. Take-Two also had a difficult year, with market value falling by 24 per cent, but the biggest loser was Atari - the company is now valued at just USD 154m compared to USD 330m in February 2005.

SCi Eidos and Namco Bandai both saw an increase in market value following merger deals, while Sega Sammy, THQ and Ubisoft also upped their values by around 30 per cent. Top of the table is Midway, however - its market value rose from USD 843m to USD 2.06 billion, an increase of 144 per cent.

Overall market value for the games industry rose by 7 per cent from USD 58.5 billion to USD 62.6 billion, despite the fact that, according to DFC's report, "Going into 2005 expectations were actually quite low."

The report stated that although sales in the first half of 2005 "significantly exceeded most expectations," the second half "has been a different story with sales off significantly."

"However, despite a minor November / December decline, stock prices have held up fairly well."