Xbox Activision deal costs Sony $20 billion in share price value
Sony’s share price has dropped by 13% in the wake of Microsoft’s intended purchase of Activision Blizzard – the lowest since 2008.
Even if you don’t care about Call Of Duty, or any of Blizzard’s game, Microsoft’s planned acquisition of Activision Blizzard is going to have major effects on the entire games industry.
Assuming the deal goes through (and the American Department of Justice is supposedly worried about it creating a monopoly) it will instantly make Microsoft the third largest games company in the world, overtaking Nintendo and sitting just behind Sony and Chinese giant Tencent.
That’s not the worst news so for Sony though, whose share price has dropped by 13% since the announcement – wiping out $20 billion (£14.7bn) from their market value.
Share prices can be highly volatile in the aftermath of big news, so it’s perfectly feasible the price could recover relatively quickly, but it makes it clear that investors and the wider world think this is nothing but trouble for Sony.
By comparison, many third party publishers saw their stock price go up, with the likes of Capcom, Square Enix, and Ubisoft all seeing sharp rises – on the assumption that their big name titles will also be of interest to Microsoft.
That’s most likely in the sense that Microsoft will try to get individual titles onto Game Pass, in the normal fashion, but it’s notable that Ubisoft’s share price rose the sharpest, by 11%, suggesting that many think they might be the next acquisition target for Microsoft.
Like Activision Blizzard, Ubisoft has recently been mired in controversy over its toxic workplace conditions and last year in particular was a lean one for them in terms of big hits.
Microsoft hasn’t yet made a statement about whether it’s still
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