Take-Two Interactive Software program reported that its web bookings hit $1.47 billion within the fiscal second quarter ended September 30, up 2% from $1.44 billion a yr in the past.
The bookings development was pushed by gross sales of the Grand Theft Auto and Borderlands franchises, and the corporate reiterated its out search for web bookings for the yr ending March 31, 2025. On a non-GAAP foundation, Take-Two stated earnings earlier than curiosity, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA, a key measure of profitability) was a lack of $75.5 million within the quarter.
All eyes are on Take-Two, as Rockstar Video games on schedule to publish Grand Theft Auto VI within the fall of subsequent yr, about 13 years after the debut of Grand Theft Auto V, which has now bought 205 million copies. Take-Two’s inventory is up 3% to $173 a share in after-hours buying and selling.
“I’m happy to report that we delivered robust second quarter outcomes,” stated Strauss Zelnick, CEO of Take-Two, in an announcement. “Our web bookings of $1.47 billion have been on the high of our steering vary, pushed by the continued success of the Grand Theft Auto and Borderlands franchises, and our working outcomes
surpassed our plans, largely resulting from a shift within the timing of selling bills inside the yr.”
Zelnick added, “Our execution has been constant, and our groups proceed to make nice progress advancing our growth pipeline. Accordingly, we’re reiterating our fiscal yr 2025 web bookings steering vary of $5.55 to $5.65 billion, and we’re assured that we are going to obtain sequential will increase and report ranges of Web Bookings in fiscal years 2026 and 2027.”
And he stated, “As we glance forward, we imagine that Take-Two stays exceedingly well-positioned for the long-term. Our imaginative and prescient is evident, our expertise is unparalleled, and we’ve one of many strongest portfolios of owned mental property in our business. With many thrilling new titles coming in Fiscal 2026 – together with Grand Theft Auto VI within the fall, Borderlands 4 and Mafia: The Outdated Nation – we anticipate to create long-term worth for our shareholders.”
Through the quarter, the corporate stated it bought the Personal Division label, which focuses on third-party unique indie titles. But it surely didn’t identify the client.
The $1.47 billion in bookings have been on the high of the steering vary.
In different particulars, web bookings from recurrent shopper spending grew 6% and accounted for 81% of whole web bookings within the quarter. The biggest contributors to web bookings have been NBA 2K25 and NBA 2K24, Grand Theft Auto On-line and Grand Theft Auto V, and Crimson Useless Redemption 2 and Crimson Useless On-line.
Within the extra informal/cellular video games, Take-Two stated the quarter benefited from gross sales for Toon Blast, the hyper-casual cellular portfolio, and Zynga’s titles together with Match Manufacturing unit!, Empires & Puzzles, Phrases With Associates and Toy Blast.
Recurrent shopper spending is generated from ongoing shopper engagement and contains digital forex, add-on content material, in-game purchases and in-game promoting.
Web bookings is Take-Two’s operational metric and outlined as the web quantity of services bought digitally or sold-in bodily through the interval, and contains licensing charges, merchandise, in-game promoting, technique guides and writer incentives.
On a GAAP accounting foundation, web income elevated 4% to $1.35 billion, as in comparison with $1.30 billion in final yr’s fiscal second quarter. Recurrent shopper spending elevated 8% and accounted for 80% of whole GAAP web income.
On a GAAP foundation, the web loss was $365.5 million, or $2.08 per share, as in comparison with $543.6 million, or $3.20 per share, for the comparable interval final yr.
Outlook
For the third fiscal quarter ending December 31, the corporate expects web bookings to be $1.35 billion to $1.4 billion, and non-GAAP EBITDA to be $78 million to $100 million.
For the GAAP fiscal yr ending March 31, 2025, Take-Two expects web income to be $5.57 billion to $5.67 billion. The GAAP web loss is anticipated to be $775 million to $839 million, whereas non-GAAP EBITDA is anticipated to be $282 million to $336 million.
The biggest contributors to web bookings are anticipated to be NBA 2K, the Grand Theft Auto sequence, Toon Blast, our hyper-casual cellular portfolio, Match Manufacturing unit, Empires & Puzzles, the Crimson Useless Redemption sequence, Sid Meier’s Civilization VII, and Phrases with Associates.
The online bookings outlook is anticipated to be in a variety of $5.55 billion to $5.65 billion, which represents 5% development over FY24.
Take-Two now anticipate RCS to develop roughly 4%, representing 78% of Web Bookings. That is up barely from the prior forecast of three%, pushed by NBA 2K. The RCS forecast continues to imagine a excessive single digit enhance for cellular, pushed by Match Manufacturing unit and Toon Blast, partially offset by declines within the hyper-casual cellular portfolio and Empires and Puzzles. NBA 2K is anticipated to develop low single digits, which is up from the prior forecast of flat, whereas Grand Theft Auto On-line remains to be anticipated to say no.
Take-Two mission the web bookings from labels to be roughly 51% Zynga, 32% 2K, and 17% Rockstar Video games. The corporate forecasts geographic web bookings break up to be about 60% United States and 40% Worldwide. Non-GAAP Adjusted Unrestricted Working Money Move is anticipated to be an outflow of $150 million, which is unchanged from the prior forecast, and the corporate stays on observe to deploy roughly $140 million of capital expenditures, primarily for sport expertise and workplace buildouts.
The outlook assumes a continuation of the present financial backdrop.
Recreation info
Since July 1, Take-Two launched Zynga’s Recreation of Thrones Legends on cellular and NBA 2K25 on the consoles and PC. Within the close to future, releases embrace Sid Meier’s Civilization VII on the console and PC on February 11, 2025. GTA VI doesn’t have a particular launch date aside from the autumn of calendar 2025.
2K will publish WWE 2K25 within the March 2025 quarter. Borderlands fall is coming within the yr ending March 31, 2026, as is 2K’s Mafia: The Outdated Nation. Zynga’s CSR Racing 3 will come out on cellular at a while sooner or later, as will Ghost Story Video games’ Judas.
The slight enhance in web bookings was largely pushed by a modest enhance in web bookings, in addition to mixture of enterprise. Within the interval, 82% of console sport gross sales have been delivered digitally, up from 75% final yr. Catalog accounted for $366.1 million (48.7% of non-mobile web bookings). Take-Two has 37 titles within the works by March 31, 2027.
Rockstar Video games
Gross sales of Grand Theft Auto V outperformed expectations and, up to now, the title has sold-in greater than 205 million models worldwide. Grand Theft Auto On-line additionally exceeded plans, pushed by sustained engagement with the Summer time content material pack Backside Greenback Bounties, and an array of updates.
Momentum additionally continued inside GTA+, as Rockstar grew its membership by 35% over final yr, and added the traditional title, Bully, to the library of obtainable video games.
Crimson Useless Redemption 2 posted one other good quarter. The title has sold-in greater than 67 million models to-date and, six years after its launch, nonetheless ranks within the high ten for unit gross sales globally, in line with GSD. Rockstar Video games was happy to increase its viewers additional with the profitable launch of Crimson Useless Redemption and Undead Nightmare for PC on October 29.
2K
On September 6, 2K and Visible Ideas launched NBA 2K25, which scored among the many highest scores on new era consoles in latest franchise historical past.
The sport has 9,000 new ProPLAY animations that present elevated authenticity; an all-new dribble engine, representing the most important technological replace within the sequence’ 26-year historical past; and a extra interactive and fascinating expertise in The Metropolis.
To-date, the title has sold-in practically 4.5 million models and achieved phenomenal RCS efficiency, the corporate stated. In comparison with NBA 2K24 for a similar interval final yr, NBA 2K25 delivered significant double-digit development in common income per person and 40% development in common video games per person.
2K’s catalog additionally outperformed, led by the favored Borderlands franchise. Now that Gearbox has formally joined the 2K and Take-Two household, Take-Two stated it’s desperate to capitalize on the numerous potential development alternatives for Borderlands, Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands, and different Gearbox titles.
Zynga
Zynga delivered one other quarter of strong outcomes. Match Manufacturing unit is scaling quickly and is on observe to turn out to be Zynga’s second largest title by the top of this yr when it comes to projected annual web bookings. The title grew roughly 16% over final quarter, pushed by its partaking gameplay, together with the latest Star Race daring beat, and our strategic investments in person acquisition.
Toon Blast is sustaining its improbable path of development, with Web Bookings growing greater than 50% over final yr, as our groups deploy extremely partaking new options, together with new single participant and crew primarily based occasions and social challenges.
The blended monetization efforts in hyper-casual are advancing effectively. Specifically, Screw Jam stays a high fifty sport within the U.S. Apple App Retailer. Nordeus launched the extremely anticipated 2025 version of the favored soccer supervisor sport, Prime Eleven. Backed by a month-long advertising and marketing marketing campaign, the discharge generated constructive sentiment across the group, which helped solidify the biggest in-app buy spending per energetic person within the sport’s 14-year historical past.
Through the quarter, Zynga launched Recreation of Thrones: Legends, and Take-Two is happy concerning the label’s future cellular launches, together with CSR 3 – Road Automobile Racing.
Personal Division
Take-Two stated it made the strategic determination to promote the Personal Division label (aimed toward third-party indie sport publishing) to focus assets on rising its core and cellular companies for the long-term. As a part of this transaction, the client bought the rights to considerably all of Personal Division’s stay and unreleased titles.
Take-Two will proceed to help No Relaxation for the Depraved, which launched in early entry on PC in April.
The corporate stated it’s grateful for the contributions that the Personal Division crew has made to its firm and is assured that Personal Division will proceed to attain success in its new residence.
As for the variety of staff, Take-Two closed the September 30 quarter with 13,077 folks, together with 10,273 in-house growth studio workers. These numbers have been up, respectively,by 110 jobs and 125 jobs. About 22% of workers have been in low-cost places (India, China, Turkey, Serbia, Chile, and Hungary).
Strauss Zelnick interview
I requested if the U.S. presidential election would impact Take-Two’s future or maybe gaming’s future.
Zelnick stated, “We’re an leisure firm. We’re targeted on leisure, not politics. I’m actually enthusiastic about our future.
Requested concerning the determination to promote Personal Division and if it was a tricky time for unique mental property, Zelnick stated, “I believe it’s all the time a tricky time for brand spanking new IP. We beat the chance in Personal Division, and that threat was primarily based on a thesis that there have been plenty of nice unbiased creators on the market we may work with and maybe construct some large franchises inside that division.”
He added, “The crew did an important job, led by Michael Worosz. Just about all the pieces that they invested in did effectively, and Outer Worlds did actually, actually, very well. However nothing, nothing broke out to the extent of one of many core mental properties at 2K or Rockstar, and our actual mission and imaginative and prescient is to make the most important hits within the leisure system. That’s what we do. We do this in cellular. We do this in content material.”
That led to the choice to divest.
Zelnick stated Rockstar hasn’t introduced a brand new GTA On-line for GTA 6, and he stated the labels make such bulletins. However he famous that the corporate doesn’t essentially should sundown prior iterations in on-line because it launches model new titles. For example, in China, NBA 2K On-line coexists with NBA 2K On-line 2.
Relating to the Nintendo speak about about backward compatibility for Swap video games, Zelnick stated, “I’m all the time optimistic when individuals are investing within the enterprise and in search of to innovate.” A spokesman added that the corporate is all the time proud of platforms that provide backward compatibility, given the power of Take-Two’s catalog. In an analyst name, Zelnick stated, “By no means rely Nintendo out.”
As for layoffs throughout gaming, Zelnick stated, “I believe that the majority corporations have gotten to no matter restructuring they wanted to do. And as , the business goes as soon as once more, and I believe it’ll stay the quickest rising a part of the leisure enterprise for a while to return.”
Since Take-Two capitalizes its prices, Rockstar’s spending on GTA 6 exhibits up on the steadiness sheet for now, and the corporate expects to incur advertising and marketing charges across the launch, stated Hannah Sage, EVP of finance and chief accounting officer, in an interview with GamesBeat. She stated the corporate largely hit its monetary targets.
Relating to Borderlands film, Zelnick stated in an analyst name that it was disappointing and the outcomes weren’t materials to Take-Two’s financials and so it didn’t break them out. The field workplace was $31 million, with prices above $110 million. He stated it drove some incremental sport gross sales.
