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Technology Stocks : THQ,Inc. (THQI) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Andrew C.R. Biddle who wrote (13075)	2/9/2000 8:22:00 AM
From: Jim Oravetz	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 14266

Semi OT Maybe this has some bearing on the softness in THQ! From Briefing.com Hasbro (HAS) 15 11/16 -3/8: The headlines note that Hasbro posted record fourth quarter and full-year 1999 revenues, earnings and earnings per share, but you wouldn't know it given the manner in which the stock is trading at the moment. That lackluster response, however, is pretty much in line with how the investment community has treated Hasbro's stock for some time now as it has been in a steady downtrend since peaking at 37 last Spring when Star Wars mania was in full swing. The Phantom Menace, though, failed to live up to the hype and it has been a menacing influence on Hasbro's stock given that the company paid its fair share to win an exclusive license to sell Star Wars toys. Although sales of those products have contributed nicely to revenue increases, they have failed to live up to expectations. To wit, the company sheepishly admitted that Christmas sales of Star Wars toys were "not that good." Another drag on Hasbro's stock price has been the problems at Mattel which have left investors somewhat distrustful of the toy stocks in general. As for its quarterly results, Hasbro posted a Q4 net of $0.79 per share, a nickel better than the First Call mean, versus $0.65 in the year-ago period. Revenues of $1.59 bln were up 22% which also happened to be the same rate of increase in inventories on a year-over-year basis. According to the company, the better than expected results were driven by robust sales of its Pokemon and Furby toys as well as traditional games such as Monopoly, Yahtzee, and Trivial Pursuit. Unfortunately, investors haven't been enamored by those results, and have chosen instead to focus on the relatively disappointing sales of Hasbro's interactive software. Q4 revenues in that area, in fact, were below 1998 levels due to the late introduction of a new product and what the company labeled as a "significant industry-wide softening of the video and PC CD-ROM business and significant price erosion." In addition, investors don't seem all that enthused either by the company's guidance for FY00. Coming off a record year in 1999, marked by 28% revenue growth and 33% EPS growth, Hasbro is forecasting that revenues should increase approximately 5% this year and EPS growth should approach 10%. In the current environment, those aren't the kind of numbers that get investors fired up.-- PJO Certainly, THQ has not seem anything like a "softening" in its sales. Still the novice investor may read this as a chance to get out of the interactive biz. Jim