In 2020, video games had revenue from the worldwide PC gaming market of almost $37 billion (U.S.) The mobile gaming market had income of approximately $77 billion (U.S.). The time, money, and attention driven to video games is monetized by companies for profit. Many of these companies are publicly traded for investors and traders to also share in these profits through higher stock prices or trading a stocks price action.
Here are the top current video game stocks in 2021.
NetEase (NTES): NetEase has created several games like Xuan Yuan Sword, Astracraft, and Identity V which are some of the biggest in China. Its game Fantasy Westward Journey is a popular game on Apple devices. NetEase averaged 38% revenue growth for the previous five years.
Sea Ltd (SE): Sea Limited owns the Garena Digital Entertainment platform and Shopee. Garena operates FIFA online, League of Legends and Heroes of Newerth in Asia. Its game, Garena Free Fire, has over 500 million mobile players. Sea Ltd grew revenue by over ten times in five years.
Activision Blizzard (ATVI): Activation Blizzard owns the Call of Duty games, World of Warcraft, Diablo, Hearthstone, Overwatch, Candy Crush and Guitar Hero.
Electronic Arts (EA): EA owns Battlefield, The Sims, Apex Legends, and Need for Speed. Electronic Arts also licences FIFA, Madden NFL, and Star Wars.
Take-Two Interactive (TTWO): Take-Two owns Rockstar Games and 2K. They own Red Dead Redemption, Grand Theft Auto, Borderlands, and NBA 2K. It operates esports leagues for NBA 2K.
Amazon (AMZN): While Amazon is one of the biggest distributors in the world for physical video game consoles, games, controllers, accessories, and monitors that is nor their biggest stake in the industry. Amazon acquired Twitch, it is like the YouTube of live gaming for the world it also streams esports competitions. Amazon also has its own gaming platform Luna which is a cloud gaming service that is integrated into its Amazon televisions. While the gaming is a smaller part of the company it could grow exponentially in coming years and add to the overall Amazon market cap.
Sony Corporation (SONY): The Sony Playstation 5 continues to be a major player in the gaming industry as it is 25% of the Sony revenue. This is a direct play on one of the most popular gaming consoles.
Microsoft Corporation (MSFT): Microsoft’s Xbox Series S and Xbox Series X were released in 2020. This stock is a direct play on the Xbox console sales and revenue. Xbox Game Pass Cloud Gaming was launched in 2019 to keep up with the future of gaming moving to cloud computing. Microsoft owns Minecraft, the best-selling video game of all time, with 200 million copies sold and 126 million monthly active users as of 2020.
Apple Inc (AAPL): The Apple app store remains one of the biggest mobile game markets in the world. To build on this success the Apple Arcade was launched which is a subscription-based cloud gaming service.
Facebook Inc (FB): Facebook’s receives gaming revenue from its integrated games on its social media site. But the more important gaming asset it owns is Oculus VR that produces virtual reality headsets, including the Oculus Rift and Oculus Quest lines for virtual reality gaming.
Nintendo (OTC: NTDOY): This is the play on the Nintendo Switch and it also owns the rights of the classic franchises like Donkey Kong and Mario.
Tencent (OTC: TSEHY): Tencent is like a video game fund with all its ownership stakes in other companies. Tencent owns 40% of Epic Games (Fortnite’s publisher) along with other ownership stakes in Supercell, Activision Blizzard, and Ubisoft. Tencent hosts multiplayer games like Call of Duty and also League of Legends. Tencent earned 30% of its total $17 billion in revenue from gaming in 2019.
Of course these stocks must fit inside your own investment method of trading strategy to be profitable as the entry and exits are important with any stocks. Whether you invest in fundamentals or trade price action these are some stocks worth examining for yourself.
