Nintendo forecasts highest profit in five years

Shares in Nintendo bucked an overall downturn on the Nikkei stock exchange in Tokyo last night to rise by 2.6 per cent, after the company revised its full-year forecast to show the highest profit recorded by the platform holder in five years.

The Kyoto-based firm lifted its net income forecast for the year which ended last week on March 31st by 27 per cent, to 95 billion Yen (665 million Euro), which is up 8.7 per cent on last year's profit figure.

The firm's overseas investments saw a 45 billion Yen (315 million Euro) gain thanks to favourable exchange rate between the US dollar and the Yen, but much of the firm's financial success can also be attributed to the performance of the Nintendo DS handheld and its software.

Although the March quarter saw a decline in revenues as stocks of the DS console dried up at retail after the New Year period, a situation only rectified by the launch of the DS Lite platform late in the quarter (and that, too, was sold out across Japan at launch), the company did manage to keep sales up by retaining stock intended for export in the Japanese market.

The DS has now sold some six million units in Japan, and Nintendo's stated target is to sell 10 million units in the region by the end of the year - suggesting that global sales could be as high as 30 million units, if growth continues at that rate in other territories as well.

Nintendo will report its full financials on May 25th.